


The Chronicle of Wasted Time

by nasri



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, M/M, Not Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Compliant, Protective James "Rhodey" Rhodes, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Has Issues, Tony Stark-centric, Tony and Steve Are Working On It, bucky is surprisingly well adjusted
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2020-07-24
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:54:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 38,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25387882
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nasri/pseuds/nasri
Summary: Somewhere between laying on the crumbling permafrost in Sokovia and finding himself alone on the cold hard ground of a Siberian bunker, Tony made the choice to stop thinking about the future. He no longer loses sleep over the delicate variables of earth’s existence. He doesn’t dream of a suit of armor around the world.He does dream of Captain America, from time to time, holding his shield to the base of his throat and pushing. He’s always slow about it and Tony wakes screaming.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes & Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Tony Stark, James "Rhodey" Rhodes & Tony Stark, Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 68
Kudos: 469





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Watch how many tropes I can pull from this hat.

When he agreed to grant the United States government a partial lease of the Avenger’s Facility, Tony was thinking of a cabin. 

Something remote and heavily wooded, a dozen acres of uninhabited damp earth. He imagined single-pane windows and Adirondack chairs where he could drink his whisky spiked coffee without being disturbed. 

Sometimes he thought about following through on that promise he made to Pepper years ago curled beneath silk sheets - the promise of a home and a baby or three and absolutely no weapons, no Iron Man suits, no tech buried beneath his skin. 

When he was sober enough to lean into the paranoia, he thought for sure the world would have ended by now anyway and this would all be dust along with his imaginary cabin tucked into the Catskills. But somehow, despite the ever increasing odds of a full-scale alien invasion, it’s move-in day and Tony is watching the security footage from his lab as Steve Rogers waltzes through his front fucking door. 

He could be anywhere but here - his penthouse on the Upper West Side or investing in some strippers out in Vegas. But his father always did call him a glutton for punishment. _Just a glutton_ , he used to answer, his tongue between his teeth. 

“FRIDAY, baby, lock down the lower levels. Daddy’s getting drunk tonight.”

“The bottle of Jameson on your work table is approximately three-quarters empty. My estimation of your blood alcohol level indicates that you are already drunk, boss,” she says.

Tony glares up at the ceiling.

“And it’s eleven forty-six in the morning.” 

—

Rhodey doesn’t even stagger anymore. He doesn’t limp or stumble when he walks through uneven doorways, and it causes Tony’s heart to swell and swell with each smooth step he takes. 

“I don’t like you staying here alone, not with the fucking Winter Solider in the room next door.”

“A few things,” Tony begins, idly spinning in his chair with his head tilted up towards the ceiling. “He’s not next door, we don’t even share a living space, not unless I want to slum it anyway. They’ve been here for the better part of two weeks and I haven’t seen hide nor hair. Second, I’m not alone. You live here too.” 

Plus, when Tony’s being honest with himself, a rare thing these days, he knows that it never was about Bucky Barnes. The very thought of Steve’s perfect fucking blue eyes avoiding his, the image of him turning away when Tony’s voice broke, still causes sparks of anger and betrayal and shame to burn behind his sternum. 

On the days he’s really, painfully honest with himself, he thinks that it feels a bit like mourning too, a kind of grief. 

“I’m active duty.” Rhodey grabs the arm of his chair, stopping him mid-spin. “You know as well as I do that there will be days I’m not here, weeks.”

Tony avoids his gaze no matter how hard Rhodey tries to maneuver himself into his line of sight. “Then quit, retire, stay at home with me and become old and decrepit and curmudgeonly.”

“You’ve been calling me curmudgeonly since MIT.” 

Tony smiles, his eyes sliding shut. “Yeah, that’s true.”

“I’m worried, Tones,” Rhodey admits on a sigh. Tony hears him sink down onto a work bench, the quiet little whir of his mechanical joints. 

“Look,” he says, opening his eyes to the profile of his best friend - the inexplicable love of his miserable fucking life. “I’m going to be fine. Just drop this Winter Soldier hang up. You know I wouldn’t have cut this deal if I wasn’t personally involved in getting the guy some real recog therapy. None of this was his fault, not really, and you can’t go around acting like he’s a pin drop from killing us all in our sleep.”

“You’re too quick to trust people.”

“No,” Tony says. “I think I learned my lesson on that front. But Barnes’ head, that’s all science, sweet thing. And science is what I trust. He’s a mess, a shell of a human being, but he’s not a homicidal monster anymore and that’s gotta count for something.”

“Can’t say it comforts me much,” Rhodey says into his hands.

Tony shrugs and resumes his spinning. “Well I can’t please everyone.”

—

Tony wears a suit to their first meeting, a charcoal Versace paired with Louboutin leather high-tops. It’s the effortlessly wealthy look that Rhodey always teases him for, but it pulls him together in some intangible way. And he needs that, he needs something that helps him feel prepared to face a room full of people who fought him without pulling their punches.

He steps through the door a fashionable seven minutes late with a member of his kitchen staff trailing behind him, pushing a full service coffee cart. “I figured we could all use a little pick-me-up,” he says with a flourishing wave. His own mug is spiked with whisky and it soothes his throat with just one sip. 

There’s a number of impatient looking holograms lined up against the opposite wall, but Tony thinks he sees Maria Hill smile.

The rest of the debrief goes well, though it’s a little stuffy for his tastes. The whole thing feels like a board meeting in a way the Avengers never used to - back when they held court over Chinese takeout and fell asleep sprawled across the same living room. 

Tony’s therapist tells him not to dwell on the past and to be wary of those rose colored lenses. He wears his glasses pink just to spite her and tries not to think about the fact that he already knows how every person in this room takes their coffee in the morning. Everyone except Barnes, he supposes.

Bucky is sitting straight up in his chair, concentrating like he expects every word of this to be on the midterm exam. But he’s cleaned up, at least. Tony spent the better part of a year reviewing hundreds of video feeds detailing the more code-driven aspects of Bucky’s therapy, carefully calibrating and taking notes. He’s seen Bucky in agony, driven to the edge of what his mind could bear. 

It made it easy to help him, despite everything, not that he’d ever breathe a word of it out loud. 

And so he takes a moment to admire just how calm Bucky looks, how focused, like his newly won sanity suits him. Though honestly his hair could use a trim. 

FRIDAY taps his wrist in warning just as it appears the generals are wrapping up, so Tony rises with everyone else when the holo-screens automatically flicker off. 

“Well, I’m glad that’s finally over. Lovely to see you all again, by the way.” He says with a toast from his empty mug. He doesn’t wait for a response before slipping out of the conference room and down the hall. 

The second the elevator doors close behind him, Tony has FRIDAY calling Peter with no more than a flick of his wrist. 

“Mr. Stark,” he answers, sounding breathless. 

“Hey, no swinging and chatting, you know the rules. Find a rooftop and give me your undivided attention.” 

He hears Peter sigh dramatically, but before Tony even reaches his bedroom the whipping static of wind has slowed and Peter’s voice sounds more measured. “What’s up?”

“Isn’t it a school day?” Tony asks, toeing off his shoes. 

Peter draws out a breathy hum, stalling for time. “Uh, free period?” 

Tony snorts. “Yeah alright, I’ll pretend to buy that. More pressing issues - do you want to come up to the compound this weekend?”

“The compound?” He asks, his voice rising an octave or so higher. 

“Yeah, Pete, the compound. Where I live.”

“But, aren’t the Avengers there now?”

“Yep. Not to worry, I’ll keep you safe from the Black Widow.”

“Honestly,” Peter laughs. “I’m not sure you could.”

“Stop hanging out with other teenagers, it’s making you rude.” Tony uncaps a decanter from the bar and pours another splash of whisky into his mug. It’s nearly empty and he makes a mental note to have it refilled. 

“But seriously, can I even be there while they are?” He asks in a rush. “Isn’t it like some super secret government location now?”

“I own the place, kiddo. You can be anywhere you want. So what’s the deal? You coming or not?” 

“Well then obviously yes. Hey! Can we keep working on that web fluid trial from last month? I’ve had a few ideas to actually get the chrystalization right this time.”

“Whatever you want, as long as you get your homework done while you’re here this time so May doesn’t threaten to castrate me again. I’ll pick you up on Friday, four o’clock?”

“Ugh, gross, Mr. Stark.”

“Four it is,” Tony says, taking a sip from his mug and contemplating whether to add more coffee or stick to the liquor. “See you then.”

— 

“I’m serious, Buck. You should stay clear of him. He’s dangerous,” Steve says quietly like he thinks someone’s listening. And of course someone’s listening, because someone’s always listening. Tony watches the footage FRIDAY compiled from the security feed while he finishes off one of DUM-E’s tamer attempts at green juice. She doesn’t trust either of them, bless every coded inch of her, and she has a habit of flagging any conversation in which Tony may have come up. 

He shouldn’t watch them, for his own sanity, but Tony has a lifelong dedication to the self-destructive and there’s no sense in stopping now.

“We live in the same building. We’re supposed to be on the same team. I’m not going to ignore the man.” Bucky’s voice sounds soft and strained, nothing like Tony remembers. “Besides, he’s only human. He’s base-line.”

“But he does this anyway,” Steve hisses back, frustrated but trying to keep himself under control. It’s a look Tony knows well, a peek at the one flaw that the serum couldn’t fix. “He fights anyway. He’s not a solider, he’s not enhanced. That’s what makes him dangerous.” 

Bucky turns, his palm braced against the wall, and Tony hears a sigh that could’ve come from either of them. “He sounds a whole lot like you did Steve, when there was barely enough of you to fit into a match box.”

“The world’s not like that anymore, Buck.”

“I don’t know,” he says. “It looks awful similar to me.”

—

“Fri? Find me some more scotch.” He’s just about as drunk as he needs to be, leading into a relatively sober weekend with Peter staying over. But not quite dangerously drunk, which is what he’s aiming for.

“The fourth floor living area, the basement kitchen, and Colonel Rhodes’ private quarters are all fully stocked.”

“Fourth floor it is,” he says, closing his eyes in time with the elevator doors. “Rhodey always knows when I’ve gotten into his bar, even if I replace it before he gets back. You better not be telling on me, baby.”

“You know I’d never do that to you, boss.”

“You dirty liar. Swap to the implant, I don’t want the speakers waking any wayward Avengers.” 

“Of course,” FRIDAY says, her voice low in his ear.

He tries to stay light on his feet as he walks over to the open bar in the corner of the communal living area, but he suspects he’s stumbling. His fine motor skills are usually relatively intact for a consummate alcoholic, but his balance never did him any favors. 

Tony pours himself two fingers into a crystal tumbler before deciding to bring the whole decanter over to the couch with him. No sense in pretending. The familiar view from the windows stretched out across the eastern wall makes Tony’s stomach lurch. Steve and Natasha were his early risers, always up before the sun. And so Tony built a whole damn wall just for them, so they could see the sunrise peak out over the trees. 

He finishes his drink like a shot and pours himself another.

“I’m a fucking idiot,” Tony says to himself, just as Bucky freezes in the doorway, pinned in place like prey out in the open. 

Tony would’ve known he was there even if it weren’t for FRIDAY and her little Morse code taps to his inner wrist - he may not have Pete’s spidey-sense but he sure as hell knows when he has the Winter Solider at his back.

“Hey,” Tony begins, turning to look at him. It’s a solid, safe start. He’s poised, he’s in control, but then the words start to tumble out before Tony’s brain can parse the difference. “I wanna tell you something.”

Bucky is dressed in sweatpants and a henley, looking nothing like the assassin who dug his fingers into his arc reactor, causing sparks of blue to fly into Tony’s periphery. He’s barefoot against the hard wood, not even wearing socks. Somehow, it makes things easier. 

Bucky takes a few hesitant steps forward, but stays even with the wall, like he needs the escape route. Tony doesn’t really blame him.

“Good enough,” he says with a wave of his hand. “I just wanted you to know - “ his speech is slurring. He can feel it, even if he can’t hear it. This is a terrible idea, he should have nothing to say to this man that isn’t specifically Avengers related. He promised himself, hell he promised _Rhodey._ “I wanted you to know that my father wasn’t a good person.” Well, he’s broken promises before. 

Bucky doesn’t flinch, he doesn’t react at all, but Tony thinks he sees something like panic in his eyes. They’re awful expressive for a super spy and he repeats that out loud before setting himself back on track. 

“Yeah, Howard. He wasn’t great. And I wasn’t quiet about it, you know? He never touched me,” he adds, waving off the imaginary question that he’d been asked by friends, fuck buddies, and therapists his whole life. “He might’ve, but he didn’t exactly see me often enough. He left discipline to the staff. He was arrogant and self-involved and tragically obsessed with Captain America. I told everyone I hated him.”

Tony takes a breath, pauses for a drink. He moves to refill his glass but decides to take a swig from the decanter instead. It’s heavy, hard to handle, and scotch drips down his chin. This is really not how he thought his night would go. “I told everyone I despised him, that I never wanted to follow in his footsteps, that we had nothing in common except for some poorly curated strands of DNA. And you know what the worst part is?” He rests his head back on the sofa, staring up at the ceiling. “I cried when he died. And not just for my mom. I cried for him too.” 

It feels right, for a moment, admitting this to his father’s killer, the man he’s seen torn apart and put back together on an endless video feed. Sometimes Tony feels like it’s his greatest secret - that some horrible, agonized part of him still misses his father. 

“It sucks,” Tony sighs after a moment’s pause, his throat bared long like he’s trying to tempt something. “It really fucking sucks to have to mourn someone you hated.”

“I don’t remember my mother or my father.” His voice is quiet and without the distant static of a security camera, without Captain America breathing down his fucking neck, Tony notices something faintly off about his inflection. He sounds like an ex-pat who’s been away too long. 

“No?” Tony looks up, his vision unsteady and blurring. “But you remember Steve.”

“Not really.” He says it like he’s admitting something too and Tony sits up a little straighter, trying to focus through the haze of alcohol. “I remember those things, my life before, like stories someone’s told me or a museum exhibit. But it doesn’t feel like me.”

“Interesting,” Tony breathes, and for a moment he’s back in grad school, studying computational neuroscience and applying theories of memory to his earliest spark of A.I. “What about Romania, Wakanda, this morning at breakfast? How do those feel?”

“Like something that happened to me,” Bucky says.

“And Hydra? Murdering my parents, murdering whomever really, take your pick ‘cause I’m not picky. How about that?”

“Like a dream,” Bucky says. “A nightmare. I remember things in pieces, but I’m never completely sure what’s real.”

“So this loyalty to our fearless leader,” Tony continues with a flourish of his hand.

“He saved me.”

“He saved _you_ ,” Tony repeats. “Not Sargent James Buchanan Barnes of the 107th Infantry Regimen.” 

Bucky nods his head, a cautious thing. 

“Two peas in a pod, huh?”

“You don’t remember the man who calls himself your best friend either?”

Tony finishes every last drop directly from the decanter and turns his head to the side, looking him up and down. “Cute, you’re cute. A sense of humor, who knew? Certainly not Rogers, I’ll bet.” He smiles, makes it a good one, the kind he sends one-night stands off with. “And here you are, lying to him because it’s just _easier._ But you know,” Tony gestures to himself. “Me too.” 

Bucky watches him, hardly moving to breathe. He’s statuesque and for a moment Tony amuses himself just by staring. 

“But if you tell me one last thing, I promise your secret will stay safe with me.” Sometimes he thinks that alcohol makes him a touch cruel, a shadow of his old man. “All I want to know is what you call yourself? What’s your name, deep inside that head of yours? You’re clearly not Bucky Barnes, haven’t been for some time.”

“I don’t have one.”

“No?” Tony asks.

“I don’t need one.”

“It’s just you in there, huh?”

“Just me,” Bucky says. He sounds grateful, but that could be the scotch. “You gonna remember any of this tomorrow?”

Tony grins, a lopsided thing. “Dunno, Barnsey.” 

“Barnsey?” He asks, a little slant to mouth, something almost like a smile. 

“Nah, you’re right. Worked for Rhodey though, so worth a shot. Anyway, I’ve gotta drive tomorrow - today - though at this point I think Happy’s going to be doing the driving.” His eyes flick to the digital clock at the corner of his lenses. “If I start sobering up now, I may barely be hungover by the time I get to Queens.”

“You should be careful,” Bucky says, sounding like it’s instinct, repetition of a phrase he’s heard a thousand times. Tony wonders if that’s what Steve tells him every time he leaves the room. “Do you need help getting back to bed?”

“Back to bed?” He asks as he does his best to reach the elevator without swaying on his feet. He’s mostly sure he manages it, but FRIDAY will certainly remind him in the morning, either way. “Darling, I haven’t been to bed. Better late than never though and all that jazz.”

Bucky doesn’t respond, but he stays in the hall watching until the elevator doors shut without a sound. 

—

Peter is like chemical disinfectant, a fresh start to Tony’s soiled surfaces. 

“It just needs to be perfect, you know?” He’s peering down at a beaker of slowly crystalizing proteins. The straps of his safety goggles are digging into his temples where he’s pulled them too tight.

“Yeah?” Tony asks, hung over and so fucking in love with this kid and his silly high school crush that he almost forgets the headache. “She the one?”

“Yeah, basically,” Peter says. 

“Should I be looking into wedding venues? You need to book two years in advanced, these days.”

Peter frowns. “MJ doesn’t believe in marriage. She says all the symbolism in Judaeo-Christian wedding ceremonies originated from a society that viewed women as chattel.” He says like it’s a direct fucking quote and Tony’s sure it is. “She’s a feminist,” he continues. “And besides, it’s only junior prom.”

“No ring then?” Tony asks, forcing down a laugh.

“She told me that engagement rings were only a thing ‘cause of marriage contracts and there’s nothing romantic about a contract.” He pauses. “And also, we watched that movie in class, you know, the blood diamonds one, with that guy from the new Tarantino movie. And so she probably wouldn’t want diamonds anyway.”

Tony takes a sip of his coffee, hiding his smile. “And what do you think, Pete?” 

Peter shrugs, pushing his goggles up onto his forehead. He has rings around his eyes, little indents of red. “I guess I don’t really care, as long as it’s MJ.”

Some days Tony considers signing his whole damn life over to the kid and flying off to drink himself to death somewhere in French Polynesia. But for all of his super powers and self-described ‘great responsibility,’ Peter still seems like just a child to him. Tony’s not sure he was ever like this, bright-eyed and sweet, which perhaps explains Howard’s barely contained distain for him. Maybe he saw too much of himself in Tony, even at sixteen. 

“Sir,” FRIDAY says softly, making Peter’s ears perk up. “Sargent Barnes is requesting access.”

“Denied,” Tony says, waving his hand to silence any follow up.

“Sargent Barnes?” Peter stumbles over his name. “The Winter Solider? The guy who caved your chest in?”

“First of all,” Tony says, picking up a wrench. “None of that is your business. Second, he didn’t cave my chest in.”

“Uh, I remember seeing you - ”

“Rogers did.” Tony continues, speaking over him. “And yes, he’s staying at the compound and _no_ I’m not answering any other questions about it.”

Peter fidgets on his stool, blinking up at Tony with his wide, watery eyes and those damn indents from his safety goggles. “Why does he want to come down here?”

“I’ve been working on his arm, the metal one. It’s been giving him problems.” He hates himself for lying but it’s easier than explaining their midnight rendezvous - a conversation Tony could hardly even piece together in the unforgiving, barely-sober light of morning.

“Oh,” Peter says, settling like this was all the information he needed. “Well that’s cool. I can leave, if you need to - ”

“What I need,” Tony says, reversing the calibration on a gauntlet just to have something to do with his hands. “Is to educate you on music that isn’t Taylor Swift. FRIDAY? Metallica.” 

“Hey,” he shouts over the sudden rush of drums. “Taylor Swift is my hero.”

“I thought I was your hero.”

Peter smiles like he’s never had his heart broken. “You’re a close second.”

—

The minute Tony gets back from dropping Peter off, he pours himself a drink. He hates leaving Peter in Queens, hates watching him sling his backpack over one shoulder and wave goodbye. Realistically, he knows he’s safe there and that May is giving him a normal life and it’s such a gift for a kid with superpowers to have a fucking bed time. And he knows it’s selfish of him to keep whisking Peter away and to dream of never returning him. But he still dreams about it. 

Scotch helps. 

Tony is a few sips away from well and truly fucked by the time FRIDAY announces that Sargent Barnes is requesting access to the lab. “Denied - actually. You know what? Let him in. Might as well ruin this whole thing too.”

“What thing are you referring to, boss?”

“Doesn’t matter, baby.” Tony waves a hand. “Let him in.” 

“So you’ll only agree to see me when you’re drunk.” Bucky is standing at the door, looking a little more relaxed than Tony feels. He almost resents him for it.

“I was with my kid yesterday.”

He looks away and Tony relishes the narrowed confusion in his eyes. “You have a kid?”

“Sort of. I semi-acquired one. It’s a long story. We have kind of a visitation deal going on and he was here for the weekend. Used to be every weekend, but then I moved out to this desolate hellhole.” He’s leaving out some important details, like how he has absolutely no right to Peter at all. It’s his aunt’s benevolence and the kid’s hero worship that keeps their tenuous relationship intact. And God he knows it’s temporary, but Tony is just drunk enough to pretend. 

Bucky hums, running his metal hand over DUM-E’s arm as it stretches out to greet him. If Tony didn’t know any better, he’d say the bot leaned in to his touch, arching like a cat. “Do you drink like this when he’s around?”

Tony’s head snaps up, a rush of anger and something close to shame burning his throat. “I’ve never had so much as a drop around him. Did you really just come down here to - ”

“I’m not sure I’ve ever seen you sober,” Bucky says. His voice is infuriatingly even and Tony wants to throttle him until it wavers. “Not since I got my head fixed anyway. So it was a genuine question.”

“Fuck you,” he spits, but he’s too drunk to really lash out, to take him apart. And besides, Bucky’s flaws are too glaring, the holes in his armor are ancient and decayed. It’s shooting fish in a barrel.

Bucky must know it too, because he stays suspiciously silent as he wanders through Tony’s lab, looking idly over blueprints displayed on glass monitors and tables littered with half-finished tech. He doesn’t touch anything and his footsteps barely make a sound. 

“I lied to the kid, told him the reason you were trying to get down here is because I’ve been working on your arm.” He sighs up at the ceiling, like he’s expecting FRIDAY to come to his rescue. “I hate lying to him. So I figured, if you want me to - “ he gestures idly at him, waiting for Bucky to pick up the slack.

“What makes you think there’s something wrong with my arm?”

Tony rolls his eyes and the room spins. “You favor it more, your center of gravity is off, gait altered. And besides, I heard through the proverbial grapevine that our favorite little princess gave you that arm just before you left. Tech like that requires dozens of calibrations over a couple of months, especially with nerve damage like you’ve got.” He finds himself drifting at the thought of it, the intricacies of neuron paths forged from vibranium. Part of him wants to anchor his fingers into his shoulder and dig just to see what he’d find. A feat of modern medical engineering no doubt and Tony suddenly wants his hands all over it.

“I lost you there, for a minute,” Bucky says softly. 

“Had an idea,” Tony says, waving him off. “So what do you say?”

He hesitates and goes still, the super-assassin equivalent of Peter’s jittery knees. “They had to put me under and restrain me to get this thing on.”

“Had to or took a few precautionary measures?” Tony has restraints aplenty, but he suspects it’d be overkill. 

“Does it matter?”

“Yeah, it kind of does. Besides, this isn’t surgery, Mr. Hyde. I’m talking touch-ups, here.”

Bucky flattens a piece of crumpled paper - Peter’s civics test with an A stamped in blue ink. “Dr. Jekyll is actually the sane one,” he says after a moment. 

“Don’t correct me,” Tony mumbles. “I know what I said.”

Bucky smiles, something Tony wasn’t entirely sure he was still capable of. He looks young. “When you’re sober then, let’s talk about my arm.”

—

Somewhere between laying on the crumbling permafrost in Sokovia and finding himself alone on the cold hard ground of a Siberian bunker, Tony made the choice to stop thinking about the future. He no longer loses sleep over the delicate variables of earth’s existence. He doesn’t dream of a suit of armor around the world. He does dream of Captain America, from time to time, holding his shield to the base of his throat and pushing. He’s always slow about it and Tony wakes screaming. 

Instead he drinks vodka in the morning and good liquor at night and looks as far into the week as he needs to in order to work out when to pick Peter up from the city. Almost everything else goes unnoticed. 

So it is, admittedly, a long time before he’s sober enough to talk about Bucky’s arm. It’s even longer before he gathers the courage. But eventually Tony’s curiosity outweighs his many neuroses, that instinct to avoid every living thing in the whole of the compound, and so he makes the call.

“Fri,” he says, downing half a glass of vodka to keep his hands steady. “Can you ask Sargent Barnes to come down here please?”

He shuffles a few empty liquor bottles into drawers and clears enough of a space for him to sit amongst the scrap metal and circuit boards that Tony hasn’t cleaned up in weeks. Peter’s been busy with decathlon and midterm exams and Pepper avoids his lab like the plague, so he doesn’t exactly have anyone to tidy up for.

He waits, somewhat impatiently, pretending to read a holo-screen until Bucky shows up wearing dark jeans and a t-shirt, his hair pulled back with a rubber band more suited to arts and crafts.

“Pepper says those pull your hair out.”

Bucky tilts his head, a silent question. 

“The rubber band,” Tony says. “We can get you proper hair ties. They’ve got ‘em in cloth these days. The height of luxury or so I’m told.” 

He shakes his head, taking a careful seat in the open space next to Tony as if he’s giving him enough time to change his mind. “And here I thought you were looking to fix my arm.”

“Multi-tasking,” he says, pulling up a blank holo-screen. “You’ll find it’s one thing I’m good at, with enough coffee in me. Alright, so tell me about the arm.”

“My response time isn’t always immediate,” Bucky says, like the start to a military check list. He rolls his shoulder once, warding off tension. “Reactions aren’t as smooth, no reflexes to speak of.” 

“Flex?” Tony asks, spinning in his chair to face him. Buck makes a fist and flexes his elbow. “Okay relax. I’m going to - can I touch you?”

Bucky looks every inch the charmer from their old history books. “Yeah, I figured that was part of the deal. Besides, last time I saw you, you looked ready to cut my whole arm open just to see the wires.”

“Hey, don’t tempt me. Get me curious and I still might.” 

Bucky shrugs, a careless thing, while Tony gently takes hold of his wrist and presses into the artificial joints. “As long as you take it off me first, you’re welcome to do whatever you’d like.” 

“I’ll try to avoid it,” Tony says, reaching for his glasses. He adjusts the digital magnification with a murmured voice command. “I have a nasty habit of taking things apart without putting them back together.”

Bucky shrugs again, the start of a smile at his lips, as if he’d let him do exactly that. 

—

Tony doesn’t establish a schedule. Instead he works on Bucky’s arm in between playing sober through Avengers status meetings and whatever R&D project Pepper has prioritized for the quarter. Bucky never complains about the sporadic late-night calls down to the lab, though sometimes Tony wishes he would just to give him someone to snap at. He’s the consummate professional in front of the Avengers and the absolutely-one-hundred-percent-functional adult with Peter, and lately he just feels like shouting. 

Maybe Happy was right and he should take up boxing again.

“What are you wearing?” Tony asks as Bucky shuffles into the lab wrapped in a thick cardigan sweater. 

“It’s always cold down here,” he says. “I’ll take it off when you need at my arm.”

“Cold?” Tony glances around for a screen before saying, “Baby, what’s the current temp?”

“Sixty-nine degrees even, boss. Just how you like it.”

Tony raises an eyebrow at him. “You getting sick over there, Jack Frost?”

Bucky grimaces, shaking his head. His hair is down today, falling limp against his jawline. “I keep my room warm.”

“How warm? You know what - Fri, set the lab to whatever Bucky’s temperature preference is.”

“I don’t think you’re going to like that, Tony. I hover in the eighty range.” It’s the first time he’s ever said his name and for a moment Tony hears a hint of old Brooklyn.

“Eighty it is.”

“You really don’t - “

“Nope,” says Tony loudly. “I don’t accept argument or criticism of any kind whilst in my lab. And besides, I get it. I mean I don’t get all this,” he gestures vaguely at the whole of him. “But I get that part, the cold.”

“Thanks,” Bucky says.

They pass an hour or two without speaking - Tony can’t keep track when he has kinetic plates and vibranium joints to fill his time. He has Bucky’s hand in his with the other prodding at his elbow when FRIDAY announces, “Boss, incoming call from Colonel Rhodes.” 

“Can I ignore it?” He asks around the magnetic screw driver he’s been holding between his teeth.

“As a reminder, Colonel Rhodes has limited downtime until the summit is over.” 

“Fine,” Tony sighs, closing up the panel beneath his elbow and setting the screw driver down. “You wanna scoot out of frame over there? And keep quiet.”

“I can just leave, if you need the time,” Bucky offers.

“No, don’t worry about it. This’ll just take a minute.”

Bucky shrugs and takes a seat at the desk on the other side of the room, watching warily as FRIDAY pulls down a screen in front of Tony. “Hey, honey. How’s Vienna?”

“Cold.” Rhodey sounds tired, and Tony glances at the timezone reading at the corner of his glasses. “Most of my effort goes into not falling asleep at these damn round tables.”

“I know how that goes,” Tony says, leaning back in his chair. “Bet you wish you were home getting drunk with me.”

“And are you?” He asks, eyebrows raised. “Getting drunk?”

“Nope,” Tony says, because it’s technically true. He’s still a little buzzed from earlier this evening when he broke into the good bourbon that he keeps in his bedroom, but otherwise he’s about as sober as he gets these days.

Rhodey looks unconvinced. “Is everything okay over there?”

“Peachy keen,” Tony says. 

“Rogers hasn’t been giving you trouble?” 

Tony waives a hand, trying to steer him away from this line of questioning as quickly as he can while Bucky is holed up in the corner of his lab. “No more than occasionally contradicting me in meetings. Anyway, when do you get back? I was thinking we could invite the kid over and make a movie night of it. He still gets a little starry eyed over you. It’s cute.”

“Why do I get the feeling that you’re avoiding the question?” 

Because Rhodey is the only person on this whole damn planet that really loves him. “Because you’re paranoid,” Tony says. “So you always think I’m avoiding something.”

“Or,” he begins, pinching the bridge of his nose like he’s trying to ward off a headache. “It’s because in the past thirty-one years, you’ve never been up front with me about the stupid bullshit that’s bothering you, Tones.”

“Maybe that’s ‘cause you call my emotional trauma stupid bullshit.”

“Don’t you even start - “

“And it’s thirty-two years, actually.” 

“You’re unbelievable,” Rhodey says, his voice muffled by his hands. 

“I know. Go to bed, sweet thing. You’ve had a long day.”

“I’m worried about you, Tony. It scares the hell out of me that I’m not with you right now.” Tony believes him, regardless of how irrational that fear may be. 

“Trust me, Rhodey, I’m perfectly fine. When do you get back?”

“Wednesday. But - ”

“Wednesday then, and I want you all to myself. I call you - first dibs. Then maybe we can bring Pete up next weekend.”

“Sure, Tones. I’ll see you then. Take care of yourself.”

Tony winks, an exaggerated thing. “I always do.” 

FRIDAY hangs up just as Rhodey groans his name, a long suffering sound. 

“Alright. You can come back over.”

Bucky hesitates for a minute, his metal hand fisted over his knee. “He thinks someone’s going to hurt you.”

“He thinks I’ll likely end up hurting myself,” Tony explains. “Besides, he always thinks that. I could live in a log cabin in the middle of nowhere and he’d think that.”

“Sounds like you’ve given him plenty of reasons to,” Bucky says idly. “And we’ve given him enough ourselves. I’m guessing he wouldn’t be too happy if he knew I was down here with you.”

“Nope.” Tony pulls him closer, setting his arm up onto a makeshift stand so he can get a better look. “Probably not. But I’m betting Rogers wouldn’t be pleased with me digging inside your shoulder, now would he?”

“Probably not,” Bucky agrees.

Tony smiles up at him. “And yet here we are.” 

—

When Rhodey does finally get back, they order an excessive spread of take-out and lay sprawled across the living room couch, watching _The Evil Dead_ with Tony’s feet tucked into Rhodey’s lap. 

“I’m just gonna go ahead and be honest with you, it’s a new thing I’m trying,” he says suddenly, speaking over the sound of a chainsaw pumping through the speakers. FRIDAY adjusts the volume slightly and Tony flicks his eyes up in thanks. “I’ve been spending some time with Barnes.”

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” Rhodes is staring at him, looking distinctly unimpressed. 

“Look, I already told you. His head is rock solid, I saw it all for myself. There’s nothing wrong with him - well that’s not exactly true. He is walking around with an only partially calibrated arm wired directly into his nervous system, so we’ve been working on that. But otherwise he’s fine.” 

“Fine?” He repeats, disbelieving. 

“Yeah, like, stable. Totally, one hundred percent safe to be around.”

“Would you let him meet Peter?” Rhodey asks.

Tony’s mouth snaps shut, because honestly he’s not thought about it. 

“If you wouldn’t want him around Peter, then Tony I don’t want him around you.” 

“First of all, I’m not sixteen.”

Rhodey’s hand tightens around his bare ankle. “But you were younger than that when I met you, Tones. So some part of you is always going to be a stupid fucking teenager to me. And it’s gonna be that way until the day I die, because God fucking help us all if I outlive you. I don’t trust him and if you don’t want him around Peter then you don’t trust him either.” 

“FRIDAY’s always watching, Rhodey. Honestly, I’m not in any danger.”

“No?” He asks. “Because, in case you’ve forgotten - “

“I haven’t forgotten anything,” Tony mumbles somewhat petulantly, but Rhodey ignores him.

“I was in Bucharest. I’ve seen what he can do when something sets him off. And Tones, I don’t care how fucking quick I am, how quick the suit is, he could kill you before FRIDAY even gets the word out that he’s gone and snapped.” 

Tony sits up, rubbing his face with both hands. He hasn’t shaved in a few days, he should probably get around to that. “What’s going to make you feel better about this, huh? You wanna talk to him? Threaten him?”

“No,” Rhodey snaps, followed by a softer, “Maybe.”

“Well good news, honeycomb. You know where he lives. Now shut up and let me watch my movie in peace.”

“You’ve talked through every movie we’ve ever watched together.”

Tony digs one toe into his thigh in retaliation. “Blasphemy,” he says.

—

The first Avengers meeting with Rhodey back at the compound is half as stressful, half as much strain on Tony’s nerves. It’s like having built in, instantaneous backup, and Tony barely pours a finger of whisky into his coffee cup before he gets dressed. It feels like an improvement.

“This is ridiculous,” Tony says, trying for calm and ending somewhere around blasé. “The Congo is a delicate, decades long conflict with a convoluted cast of characters. To act would inherently mean taking sides, and let’s face it, it would probably be the side that fucked the whole country up for mining contracts to begin with. How many of those contracts does the good ol’ U.S. of A hold directly, Secretary?”

“People are dying,” Steve says, before Ross can answer him.

“People are always _dying_ ,” Rhodey argues, his arms folded. “But we’ve come a long way since World War II, Rogers. There’s consequences for getting involved in a conflict like this. America’s spent the past forty years figuring that out the hard way.”

“And refusing to learn the lesson,” Tony mumbles, thinking fleetingly of Afghanistan. 

“I agree with Stark.” Both Rhodey and Steve fall silent, turning to stare, as if they’d forgotten Bucky was even in the room. It’s an easy thing to do really, because despite his careful attention he’s never once spoken out about anything. 

“The UN and the ICC already have a reputation for disproportionately policing Africa compared to the rest of the world.” Bucky continues, like he’s reading verbatim from a case briefing. “There is a legitimate and well-founded belief that any movement here would be due to mineral wealth. Involving the Avengers, even to a diplomatic extent, would only further that belief.” 

Bucky is looking straight at Ross, like it’s a reminder of the many state secrets that still live inside Bucky’s head. 

“We’ll table this,” Ross says eventually. “I’ll have my team draft up a memo - “

“No need,” Tony says loudly, already typing away at his phone. “I have contacts at the IRC, they’re sending over some late night reading material now.” He winks. “I’ll make sure everyone gets a copy. And look at that! We’re at time. Lovely to see you all, but I’ve a date with a very impatient board of directors. You know how it is.”

He makes what he hopes is a graceful exit, but it probably comes off more like a retreat. 

—

The next time Tony has Bucky holed up in his lab with his arm flayed open, he thanks him.

“For what?” He asks, watching idly as Tony sticks disposable electrodes over his shoulders, both flesh and metal. 

“For taking my side in the meeting last week.”

Bucky snorts. “I didn’t speak up because I like you, Tony. I took your side ‘cause you were right.”

“Still,” he says with a shrug. “I bet there was more than one person in that room who thought I was right. Didn’t hear a peep out of anyone else though. So I appreciate the help.”

Bucky nods absentmindedly, like he’s considering a different issue entirely. “How close were you? Before I came along.”

“To Rogers?” He asks, staying focused on his arm, refusing to give Bucky the chance to look him in the eye.

“Yeah.”

He struggles to keep his tone neutral, like he’s not still carrying around some deep seated feelings about the whole thing, like thinking about it won’t make his hands shake. “We didn’t get along at first. I don’t react well to rigidity and that stick up his ass sure was stiff.” 

Bucky laughs - a soft, rare sound. “And then?”

“And then I guess we became friends. I’m sure you’ve noticed by now, but I don’t exactly have many of those. Though, I might’ve been downgraded from friend to reluctant acquaintance around the time I allowed my severe paranoia to get the better of me and nearly destroyed the world in an attempt to save it.” Tony waves a hand. “So anyway this whole Accords thing really brought out my childhood abandonment issues and oddly skewed me back on a lifelong trajectory towards substance abuse. So yes, we were friends. Past tense. It’s fine.” 

“If it helps, you’re probably my only friend, if I can even call you that.”

Tony glances up at him for a long moment, taking in the sharp edge of his profile. “You can share DUM-E and U. Fri too of course, but she’s a bit harder to win over.”

“A bit?” FRIDAY asks. “DUM-E likes whoever walks into the lab.”

“True,” Tony says. “I routinely threaten to sell him for scraps and he still likes me. But, you know, do with that what you will. There’s something to be said for unconditional love.”

Bucky smiles. “Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind.”

—

“Boss,” FRIDAY says into his ear, waking him from the fitful nap he’d been taking on the couch in his lab. “It appears that Colonel Rhodes is talking to Sargent Barnes.”

“Jesus Christ,” he mumbles, pulling himself up. “Has it devolved into a fight yet?”

“Would you like to see?” 

“Sure, why not.” He fumbles for his glasses just as Friday pulls up the footage of them standing in what must be Bucky’s bedroom. “He hasn’t decorated it much, huh?” Tony asks, squinting at the plain, white walls.

“No, sir.” 

“Up the audio, Fri. But put it through to my implant.” 

“I understand why you’re concerned,” Bucky says, with the exaggerated calm that he sometimes uses with Tony. The one that seems practiced. “But with all due respect, Colonel, if nineteen of the world’s top psychologists and neurologists, state of the art Wakandan tech, and _Tony Stark_ couldn’t catch me in a lie, what makes you think that you could?”

“Tony’s superpower is trusting the wrong people. I’m his gut check.” 

Bucky turns to sit on his bed and Tony loses sight of his expression. His voice is apologetic though, perhaps a little pained. “A gut check,” he repeats. “But you didn’t see Obadiah Stane for what he was.”

Tony breathes in sharp, involuntary. 

“Excuse me?” Rhodey spits. 

“Because you were away more often, I suppose. Working on that promotion. But you were around him for years, decades even, and never thought he’d rip Tony’s heart out and leave him for dead on his living room floor while you were off playing errand boy - “ 

Rhodey lunges for him and in seconds he has one hand braced around Bucky’s throat as he decks him hard in the mouth, snapping his head back. Rhodey quickly backs away, ready for a fight but keeping himself out of Bucky’s immediate reach. Tony knows he’s thinking of Bucharest. Neither of them move for a moment and Tony is half way down the hall with a suit on standby when Bucky settles back onto the bed spread, blood dripping down his chin. 

“You can hit me again, if you want.”

Rhodey doesn’t say anything, but he lowers his fists slowly. 

“You can hit me as many times as you want and I won’t hit back. I won’t snap. I’m no more likely to lose my head than you are, Colonel.”

Tony stumbles to a halt, watching the footage intently from the lenses of his tinted glasses.

“But you can try, if it’ll help.”

“You want me to beat you bloody in order to convince myself you’re not dangerous?” Rhodey sounds incredulous - the most familiar thing in the world to Tony. 

“Well,” Bucky says, wiping his mouth. “You’ve technically already beat me bloody. And for what it’s worth, I have mandatory check-in’s every two weeks with the UN psychoanalysts and monthly scans to make sure there’s no regressions or abnormalities. Tony’s reckless, but he’s not an idiot.”

“Shows what you know,” Rhodes says, sounding somewhat distant. “Tony is the world’s biggest idiot.”

—

“So I’m guessing FRIDAY showed you the footage.”

Tony is nearly confident enough in his work that he probably doesn’t need to look over Rhodey’s braces before every trip, but it soothes the sleepless, nagging part of himself that wonders what might happen if they ever stopped working properly while he’s away. 

“She clued me in the second you stepped foot in Bucky’s bedroom, actually.”

“Great,” Rhodey mumbles. “Do you really think we can trust him?” His voice is nearly a whisper, uncharacteristically soft for a man raised on military orders.

“I don’t know, honey bee. But I don’t think we ever know, really. He was right on that. We couldn’t have seen Stane coming, but then again, we didn’t see Peter coming either. It’s like experimental biochemistry - you just don’t know what’s going to work and what’s going to turn you into a giant green rage monster.”

“That’s uncharacteristically insightful.” 

“I’m mostly drunk right now.”

Rhodey snorts. “God, you’re a mess.”

“Your mess,” Tony corrects him. “And a little bit Pepper’s mess when it comes to S.I.” Tony pats his thigh, the universal sign that they’re done for the day. Rhodey stands, making a scene of testing out his knees and hips, though they both know he doesn’t feel any difference with such minor adjustments. He always pretends he does anyway. 

“Hey, you know he was just trying to rile you up, right? That stuff he said about you off getting a promotion. It was all bullshit, he was just trying to get to you.”

“Yeah,” Rhodey says, looking back down at his legs. He lifts one knee, then the other. “I know. Anyway, I’ll be back in just a week this time. I only need you to stay out of trouble for six days.”

He knows why he’s changing the subject. Rhodey still carries the weight of the arc reactor like it’s his own chest it was buried in. 

“I think I can manage six days, though I’ll miss you terribly.”

Rhodey rolls his eyes and Tony blows him a kiss. 

—

Bucky still has a split lip when FRIDAY lets him in. 

“You can be here, but no talking. I’m trying to get through something.” He’s down to Pepper’s production deadline, and he can’t even get drunk until the damn diagnostics clear. “Fri, up the room temp.” 

Bucky murmurs an amused, “Thanks,” and settles silently on the couch in the corner with Peter’s book from American Lit open on his lap. He’d left it two weeks ago, after restlessly inching his way through the three chapters assigned for homework, and Tony had to courier him another copy for class the next day. 

It’s nearly an hour before Tony gets a positive diagnostic result. He’s jittery with it - focus and the itch that comes from sitting too long with a clear head. 

“Fucking finally.” He snatches a bottle of scotch off the table, tears the stopper off with his teeth and takes a long, settling drink. 

“Not even using a glass, huh.”

Tony had nearly forgotten about Bucky, sitting cross-legged on the couch, the blue of the book cover peeking out from between his fingers.

“Sorry, why are you here again?”

“I like spending time with you,” Bucky says and it makes Tony want to lash out, to push him out of his lab and make sure he takes that fucking book with him.

“Why?” He snaps. “Because I’m the only person in the whole fucking building you’re not lying to?”

“No,” he says, easy and even. “Because you weren’t brainwashed and tortured by Hydra for a couple decades and you’re still barely functioning. In fact, I’d say you might be in worse shape than I am.” He licks the tip of his metal finger before turning a page. It’s infuriatingly unnecessary and Tony grits his teeth. “It makes me feel better about my precarious headspace, to see you choose to drink yourself to death.”

“Alright, you can leave,” Tony snaps, setting the bottle down with a sharp clink of glass on metal. 

“I don’t think you really want me to,” Bucky says, looking directly at him like he’s daring Tony to look away. “Because I’m pretty sure you feel the same way about me. Like you said, two peas in a pod.”

“I watched you try to convince Rhodey to beat you to death. I don’t know if you have a leg to stand on at the sanity starting line.”

Bucky shrugs and Tony suddenly kind of wants to punch him in the mouth too. “It worked though, didn’t it? Besides,” he snaps the book shut and lays out on the sofa, stretching his arms above his head. “When I’m here, it’s less depressing that you’re drinking directly from a bottle at two in the morning because as long as you pour me one, then you’re technically not drinking alone.” 

Tony watches him for a long moment. “Well,” he sighs. “A coffee mug will have to do.”

—

At this point, Tony knows there’s nothing wrong with his arm. He’s spent weeks meticulously learning every mechanical nuance, every nerve ending, and he knows for a fucking fact that there’s less of a reflex delay in that thing than a damn major league catcher’s got. But once a week, without fail, Bucky will still shuffle through the doors to his lab complaining about a glitch or three - that he can’t gauge his grip or his reactions are off. Then, once Tony has looked him over, he settles in like he owns the place.

Tony humors him, though. He’s selfless like that and the arm itself has given him an entire network of ideas to work off of. Wakandan technology is still years ahead, but just this glimpse into their neuro-tech has Tony closing the gaps in double time. Besides, it’s not a hardship to keep his hands busy while regaling Bucky with tales of his romantic mishaps and technical revelations. Tony loves a good performance and Bucky is his best behaved audience these days. 

“Of course, Rogers didn’t find it particularly funny. Got a good laugh out of Brucie, though.” Tony cuts himself off, not ready to stumble down the mental what-if’s associated with Bruce Banner’s disappearance off-world. He takes a sip of his whisky spiked coffee. It’s gone cold and he clears his throat to ward off the burn. 

“Was this before you were friends?” Bucky asks.

Tony hums, buying time. “I’d like to think we were always friends, built that way and everything. The only scientists on the team, birds of a feather.” 

“I meant Steve,” he says.

“Oh. No. That was after.” Tony lets go of Bucky’s arm, instructing him to roll his shoulder so he can make sure he put everything back how it was meant to be. He steps away, clapping his hands. “Alright, you’re all set.”

Bucky doesn’t stand. He stays hunched forward, his hands gripping the edge of the work table he’s been sitting on. “Why do you act like you hate him?”

Tony pretends to busy himself with his tablet, keeping his back turned. “Maybe ‘cause I kind of hate him, Old Man Winter.”

“Do you hate me still?” He asks it so matter-of-fact, like he’s truly just curious.

“I never _hated_ you. I didn’t even know you.”

“Then why are you still angry with Steve? You’ve gotten to know me now, right? I’m not a problem anymore, so you - “

“Look, not everything is about you, alright?” Tony snaps. He deflates almost immediately, groaning into his hands. “God, I need a drink. A real drink. Several drinks, in fact.”

“Then what is it about?”

“I don’t want to have this conversation right now,” he says, digging through his desk drawers until he finds a mostly full bottle of vodka. He’s not sure how exactly he can express the burning that Steve Rogers brings out in his chest and he’s certain he doesn’t want to try.

“I’m sure you don’t. I’m sure you tell your friends that, your therapist. But I’m also sure that it’s fucked you up enough that this is how you react to someone invoking his name in the same room as you. So if one day, after you’ve nearly drank yourself to death over him, you finally want to talk about your feelings for Captain America know that I’m a relatively unbiased party that owes you a lifetime of favors.” Bucky hops off the counter, heading for the lab door. 

Tony takes one swig of vodka before shouting after him, “If you owe me, you’re hardly unbiased.” 

Bucky lingers for just a moment, drumming his metal fingers against his leg. He smiles then. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.” 

—

Tony hates himself for it a little bit, but he kind of gets used to having Bucky around. It’s a bit like having Peter nearby, but without the pressure to appear less like an alcoholic with an anxiety disorder and some lingering PTSD. It’s calming, mostly, except for Bucky’s increasingly common late-night tendency to take the metaphorical pickaxe to his temple with an aim to dig. Maybe it’s all the time spent with therapists these days that has him trying to shrink heads. 

“Your kid is smart, right?”

Bucky tried to take up cross-word puzzles, but found the references too varied for him to really pin down. Instead, Tony gave him a sudoku book and a glaringly pink ink pen and watched him go. He sits with his feet propped up on the titanium drawer of a tool chest, scribbling numbers into the margin of his book.

“Smarter than you, anyway,” Tony says, watching him out of the corner of his eye. “Certainly smarter than me.”

“So,” he murmurs, sucking on the cap at the end of his pen. “Do you think he hasn’t noticed that you have a drinking problem?”

Tony feels anger more like a reflex than anything and tightens his grip on the tablet in his hands. “I know what you’re trying to do.”

“It’s just a question,” Bucky assures him. “I really want to know what you think.”

“I think he’s barely here anymore, not like when I lived in the city. I don’t see him every day.”

“But you see him enough,” Bucky says. “And you said he’s smart.”

“One more word and I’ll lock you out for a week.”

“Not sure you’d survive it, tin man.”

Tony glares over his shoulder, but even that is half-hearted. “Don’t test me.”

“Alright,” Bucky says, finishing another puzzle in a scatter of numbers. “It was just a question.”

—

“So are you like, friends with the Winter Solider now?” Peter asks. He’s flipping through something and Tony turns just in time to catch a glimpse of one of the sudoku books that Bucky finished last week.

“First of all, he’s not the Winter Solider. He’s not cool enough to be referred to regularly as the Winter Solider, he’s actually a total dunce. Second, how do you know it’s his?”

“You only really let Mr. Rhodey and Ms. Potts down here, and I’m pretty sure neither of them are hanging around doing puzzles. They seem busy and important. Also there’s this.” Peter flips a page and holds it up for him, pointing at the lower right hand corner. He sees a little doodle of himself in gel pen, arguing with DUM-E while shaking one pudgy cartoon fist. 

Tony groans but Peter is smiling, flipping through to book to check for more drawings. “I like him, he’s funny.”

“You don’t even know him.”

“Yeah, but I’ll bet he’s funny. Hey - look!” Peter shows him another page, with a doodle of Tony sulking over one massively swollen finger. 

Tony looks down at his own bandaged finger. Last week he’d sliced his hand open working on the simplest of engine repairs for one of his classics. Bucky had laughed and laughed until Tony got up and tried to glue the cut closed, which had him scrambling off the bench to help. “Rhodes was right,” he’d said, dabbing at Tony’s skin with an alcohol wipe from the first aid kit that sat mostly untouched in a drawer. “You are the world’s biggest idiot.”

“That’s it, I’m gonna ban him from my lab. At the very least, ban him from demeaning drawings.”

“I think they’re cute,” Peter says.

“You think everything’s cute.” 

“Oh my god,” he begins, snapping the book shut. “That reminds me, did I show you the videos from the animal shelter last weekend? C’mere, they’re so adorable. You should see the dogs.”

“I’m familiar with what dogs look like,” Tony says, but he sits beside him anyway, slinging his arm across the worktable and letting Peter lean in as he situates his phone for them both to watch.

“Yeah but you haven’t seen these dogs. You should adopt a dog, Mr. Stark. My building doesn’t allow us to have them - ”

“I’m pretty sure the real issue here is that May wouldn’t allow it,” Tony says, as some kind of collie mutt tackles Peter in the video. He hears his distant laughter through the static of the speaker.

“Yeah,” he sighs. “But you’ve all this space and stuff and you own the place! So no one can tell you not to have a dog.”

“Dunno if you’ve noticed kid, but I’m more in the business of adopting stray people.”

“Yeah,” Peter tilts his head onto his shoulder. “Like me and the Winter Solider.” 

“Very different circumstances there, but sure.”

“Not really,” Peter says, swiping to the next video. “Oh my god, this is the one with the golden retriever. Look, Mr. Stark! He’s so smart - always brought the ball straight back. Like DUM-E, but soft.” 

Tony nods along, breathing in the smell of Peter’s shampoo. He’d buy the whole damn shelter if it kept Peter laughing like this, delighted by a game of fetch. “What’d you name him?” He asks.

Peter grins up at him knowingly. “Thor, you know, ‘cause of the color of his fur.”

—

It’s half past three in the morning when FRIDAY tells him that Bucky is requesting entry. 

“Pull up the footage?” Tony asks, his voice hoarse from a twenty-hour stint locked in his lab, speaking to no one save for the occasional hissed argument with DUM-E. 

Bucky materializes on the screen in front of him, wearing sweat pants and a heavy hoodie, shifting from foot to foot. His hair looks a mess, like he was tossing and turning and rolled straight out of bed.

“Send him down and crank up the heat. Full blast.” 

Bucky stumbles through the door, washed out and pale, with none of the careful calm and indifference that he usually displays when they’re together.

“What’s going on?” He asks, standing. 

“Sometimes,” Bucky says, his voice barely a whisper. “I wake up and I don’t know what’s real. I needed to see you, see the lab - ” His eyes are darting around wildly, like he’s still deep in a REM cycle, dreaming in sparks of light. “‘Cause they couldn’t have made this stuff up. Couldn’t have made you up.”

“Hey,” Tony says taking a cautious step forward, his hands held out. “Everything’s fine. This is all real.”

Bucky nods, a little unsteady. “Yeah, I know. I know you’re real.”

“Okay. You wanna come sit with me then? I was about to start something new anyway, working on digital flashcards for the kid. He hates studying for history. Sometimes it’s good to take a break from revolutionizing the tech world and do something simple.” 

Bucky doesn’t say anything for a moment, his eyes still scanning the room like he expects to find one of Hydra’s many heads lurking in a corner. But eventually he settles into that iron spine and walks to Tony’s side, sinking down next to him.

Tony turns slowly, projecting every movement, because he’s still painfully aware of what that vibranium hand feels like around his throat. Eventually he reaches out for Bucky’s shoulder. “What can I do?” He asks, as Bucky leans into the touch.

“Just talk to me? For a little while. Tell me about your cards.” His eyes are closed as Tony dips his hand down his spine, moving slow and soothing like he would with Peter, when he wakes feeling trapped beneath the weight of concrete. 

“They’re Pete’s flashcards, really. He uses these colored paper ones but loses them all the time. I find them under pieces of my Iron Man suits on a daily basis. Can never keep them straight. So I thought I’d build him a little hologram version that he can clip onto his pencil as he writes.”

Bucky doesn’t answer, but Tony thinks he must still be listening, so he continues doing what he does best and he talks.

—

Tony doesn’t think he’s a big fan of Sam Wilson. He’s irrevocably, unwaveringly on Steve’s side, and just as fucking righteous. So when it comes time to mend his suit or make wing repairs, Tony does things the hard way and eye-balls it.

“You’d just need to bring him down here for a half hour or so, right? To get all the sizing done?” Bucky asks, watching as he has FRIDAY pull up scans from the security footage in the gym. 

“This is my space,” he says, gesturing at the lab. “And my therapist likes to tell me that I have a right to my space and that means I have a right to not invite a man who so obviously despises me into my lab when he’s already living in my home.”

“I don’t think he hates you, Tony.”

“Shows what you know, Miles Monroe. Besides, I can do it just fine from FRIDAY’s scans.”

Bucky rolls his eyes but doesn’t push any further. Despite his insistence, it does take Tony the better part of three hours to finish. Bucky comes and goes, reappearing at some point freshly showered as if he’d been to the gym. 

“Good timing,” Tony says, sitting back and looking around for the half-empty bottle of Jack he’d gone through the night before. “I just finished, which means it’s time for a drink.” 

“Don’t,” Bucky says, stopping him before he can even reach for the bottle. “Not tonight. Just - sit with me. We can watch a movie, order dinner. Hell, I could cook.”

“You can cook?” Tony asks, curious. He wonders when exactly Hydra had the time to teach him to use an electric stove.

“Don’t pour that drink and maybe I’ll show you.”

They end up in Tony’s kitchen with the ingredients for a solid veggie omelette spread out on the counter. 

“I don’t know if this counts as dinner,” he says, watching Bucky dice a bell pepper. 

“If you stocked any actual food, and not just on weeks when Rhodes is going to be in town, we’d be having dinner. But instead you have enough for omelettes, so we’re having omelettes.” 

Tony steals pinches of grated pecorino and gouda from Bucky’s cutting board while he tries to swat him away. “This is the only cheese left in the fridge, so if you eat it all, you’ll be the one getting an omelette without cheese.”

“Rude,” Tony says, hopping up onto the countertop to watch as Bucky beats a half dozen eggs and slides a spoonful of that heart-healthy fake butter Rhodey insists on into the pan. “So what’s your specialty? Are you a barbecue kind of man? Or something more Russian - borscht?” 

Bucky smiles but it doesn’t look quite real, not like the one he had when he caught Tony stealing little bites of bell pepper from the cutting board. “My speciality is anything quick and efficient enough to keep me fed while out on missions. When I was on my own in Romania, I didn’t do much cooking at all. I liked fruit, cheese, fresh bread, the kinds of things I didn’t have before.” 

“Fruit and cheese, huh? You lush,” Tony hums, kicking his feet just to hear them clatter against the cabinets. “Is there anything you like that isn’t stocked in the fourth floor kitchen? FRIDAY doesn’t usually take special orders, but I’ll have her make an exception for you.”

“There’s more choices down there than I know what to do with.”

“Fruit though,” Tony says, taking a sip of the coffee he’d made earlier. It’s mostly gone cold, but it does the trick. “I can do fruit, more fruit, some imported French cheeses and stuff. What have you tried or what haven’t you tried, I guess. You know what? Never mind. I’ll figure it out. Are you a fig guy? I bet you’re fig guy. Ever had a medjool date?” 

“Tony,” Bucky says his name in a way he’s never heard before, not from Pepper or Rhodey or Peter. Certainly not from Steve. “Get some plates out. These will cook quick once I get them in the pan.”

Tony manages a false salute and hops down from the countertop. 

—

Tony might’ve successfully spent one night sober with Bucky’s cheese omelettes and some space documentaries, but he spends the next one completely shit faced, eventually vomiting into a fire safety bin just as Bucky walks through the door. 

“Tony,” he murmurs, and he might say something else but Tony can’t hear him over the ringing in his ears. 

Bucky helps him sit back, propped up against the side of a desk, and hands him a water bottle. Tony gargles and Bucky reappears a moment later with a clean microfibre cloth that he uses to wipe his face. He’s sweating and running cold, too close to passing out to care much about either. 

“I think I made tidal power more efficient today,” Tony says, his voice hoarse. “I’ve been working on it for a while. Brazil is the world’s leader in hydropower, but it’s so specific to their coasts and tides and I thought there had to be a way to maximize output on those turbines without sticking them half way into an ocean trench with millions in upkeep costs a year. South East Asia, you know, ideal except for La Niña and you gotta consider La Niña.”

“You’re too smart for your own good.” Bucky’s face is hazy, blurry, too indistinct to make out the details. 

“That’s usually an insult. And one that I must say I’ve gotten before, so no points for creativity. Also, fuck you. I may have given up on saving the world but I did just make ground breaking changes to a turbine that can revolutionize another area of green energy, help island nations - ”

“Not an insult,” Bucky says, cutting him off. Tony feels his hand linger at the back of his neck, a gentle brush of his fingers against his pulse point. “Just a fact. It probably hasn’t been easy for you.”

Tony closes his eyes. Bucky’s hand is dry and warm and Tony allows himself to give in to the pull of vertigo and tips forward to rest his head against his collarbone. “Let’s not cry tortured genius, shall we?”

“Not tortured,” he says into his hair. “But I bet it’s lonely.” 

“It’s not.”

“Okay,” Bucky whispers. “But for the record, I don’t think you’re done saving the world.”

Tony is so drunk, but here with his eyes closed and Bucky’s fingers combing through the short hair at the back of his neck, he feels alright for just a minute. “You wanna tell me more about your turbine?”

“Yeah. But I may need to throw up again.”

Bucky laughs and Tony feels it against his temple. “Okay.”

He falls asleep on the couch with no memory of ever moving beyond the weight of Bucky’s shoulders. That night he dreams of alien space ships, of an invading army, legion to earth’s limited warriors. He’s too drunk to remember it when he wakes. 

—

“I thought maybe you were going to cut back,” Bucky says, watching him from the lab door.

“You’ve not even said hello,” Tony says without turning. He’s been drinking away his hangover since around three o’clock. It seemed close enough to five to do the trick. “And already you’re down my throat.”

“Not quite down your throat,” he hums. Tony has a salacious comment on the tip of his tongue, but he swallows it back. “I guess I was just hoping I’d find you sober. Or close to sober. After last night, anyway.”

“Mm, you don’t always get what you want,” Tony sings, lazily. Vodka keeps him clearheaded but morose. 

“What would it take for you to cut back?”

He’s heard this question a thousand times from Pepper, whispered into his bare shoulder, the silk of her dressing grown cool to the touch. He heard it from Rhodey in their shared apartment when Tony would crawl into his bed sick from a hangover, nowhere near old enough to drink. 

“I mean this in the kindest way possible, Buck, but fuck off. You’ve not even gotten around to telling Rogers that you’re reverse Overboarding him. Two peas in a pod, remember? So if I want to get black-out drunk every day to prevent myself from going crazy, or more accurately to keep myself from leaping off the roof of this fucking building, then you’re going to stay quiet about it because you’re sitting pretty in a glass house over there and buddy it’s cracking.” 

Bucky takes a seat beside him, sprawling his legs out in front of him. “I can’t even begin to figure out what _reverse Overboarding_ is.” 

“It was a movie, about amnesia. Goldie Hawn - you know what, it doesn’t matter. The point is, fuck off about my drinking.”

Bucky doesn’t argue, in fact he doesn’t say anything at all, and Tony might find it awful suspicious but honestly he’s too drunk to care.


	2. Chapter 2

“How come he’s never here when I’m here?” Peter asks, flipping a wrench around and around while Tony is wrist deep in a damaged cleaning bot. 

“I thought I was meant to be teaching you robotics,” Tony says. “But what really seems to be happening is that I’m single-handedly fixing a bot I automated repairs for years ago and you’re over there day dreaming.”

“I’m paying attention!” Peter insists, dropping the wrench with a clatter. He winces. “I just asked a question.”

“You don’t need more distractions than you already have down here,” he says by way of explanation. “Now come on, get in there. The circuit fan is cracked. It blew out one of the hall effect sensors.”

“So we need replacements?” Peter asks, peering into the open circuitry. 

“For the fan yes, but you can fix the sensor. Go get your welding mask.” 

“I could totally just wear my Spiderman mask,” Peter says.

“Go get your welding mask.” 

Peter sighs, unnecessarily heavy in the way only teenagers can manage with any honestly. “Am I ever going to get to meet him? You can invite him to movie night.”

“I’m pretty sure Bucky doesn’t want to listen to you recite all the words to the _Empire Strikes Back._ ” 

In truth, he’s not sure he’s ready for it. He doesn’t want to share his kid, doesn’t want to have his attention fractured when they’re together. He wants to keep him hidden away, frozen in time so that he never gets much older than this, holding a soldering iron like a pencil.

“Pete - no. Here, you hold it like this.”

“For the record,” Peter says, his mask pulled up to show his face. “I totally wouldn’t recite all the words if we had company.”

“ _Company_ ,” Tony snorts, grabbing his own pair of goggles from the work table. “Sure, I’ll think about it, kid.”

—

“I talked to Steve.”

“Huh?” Tony doesn’t look up from his 3D model, though he is a little surprised to hear his voice. He didn’t really register when Bucky came into the lab and FRIDAY almost never warns him anymore, unless he’s in a mood or on a call for S.I. But even then, he usually lets him in anyway. 

“About my memory. I talked to Steve.” 

He glances at Bucky from over his tinted glasses. “Yeah? How’d that go? And please don’t tell me you did this just so I can’t throw it back in your face anymore while I’m being a belligerent drunk.” 

He pauses for a moment. “You weren’t belligerent. Besides, you were right.”

“Sit down,” Tony says. “You look a little green around the gills. Up the temp, Fri. I’m thinking a cool eighty-two. Did Roger’s scream you out of the room or something?” 

“I’m fine.” He sits anyway, settling on the bench beside Tony. It’s where Peter sat a few hours earlier, chattering incessantly as he watched Tony modify his designs. “He was quiet, actually. He just kind of stood there.” 

“Is it worse, that he didn’t yell?” Tony asks, turning his attention back to the screen.

“Probably,” Bucky admits. 

“And how do you feel about it?” He sounds like a television talk-show therapist, but he also suspects that not many people have asked how Bucky feels about much of anything.

“He asked if I thought it was something that could be fixed. I told him no. And I’m not sure I’d want to even if we could. So a part of me feels something - guilt I guess.”

“Well,” Tony says, putting away his notes with a starburst flick of his fingers. “Some part of me wishes I wasn’t an alcoholic, but it sure isn’t big enough to keep me from finishing off a bottle of whisky before bed.”

Bucky snorts with laughter but quickly goes silent again, staring off at the wall on the opposite side of the lab. “Do you mind if I spend the night down here? I’m not sure I’ll sleep well with Steve shuffling his feet outside my door.”

Tony groans in sympathy. “Yeah, of course. There’s always the guest rooms in the penthouse. You’re welcome to crash in one of them if you ever need it. Maybe just avoid Rhodey at the coffee machine in the morning. He doesn’t look it, but he’s old, you know. He might actually have an aneurism.” 

“Thanks for the offer,” Bucky says, leaning back against the workstation. “But honestly, I’m more comfortable down here.”

Tony hums. “Wanna make dinner with me, first? Rogers can’t get into my kitchen. Plus, Rhodey and Pete both like the common area warm, so it’s already in your temperature range and everything.”

Bucky looks at him and maybe for the first time he seems a bit surprised. “Can you not drink tonight? Maybe let that part of you that wishes you weren’t an alcoholic take over and hang out with miserable ol’ me?”

“Oh what, you don’t like taking care of me when I’m blacked out?”

Bucky smiles. “I need your couch tonight so you can’t pass out on it.”

“Fine. Though for the record, no reason we couldn’t both fit,” he says with a wink. 

“You’re right,” Bucky says, trailing after him. “You are very small.”

“Not where it counts, Frosty.” 

Bucky laughs, louder than he used to, with his head tipped back.

—

Bucky is fiddling with a pair of high power magnets, letting them slide through his metal fingers. Their shoulders are brushing and it’s making it awful difficult to concentrate on much of anything with all the twitchy movement. “How’d you meet your kid anyway? I’m assuming at this point that he’s not some long lost child out of wedlock.”

Tony hums for a moment, treading water while he decides whether or not to tell the truth. “Hate to upset your old man sensibilities, but wedlock isn’t exactly a thing anymore. And well - he’s Spiderman.”

“Spiderman,” Bucky repeats. “The guy who grabbed my arm and - actually, no, this makes a ton of sense.”

Tony winces. “Yeah.”

“So bringing a school kid into a fight, huh. What hairbrained scheme were you chasing that time?”

“In my defence,” he begins, as if he could really even justify it to himself. “I wasn’t expecting a fight. He had some serious web power, seemed like a good kid, and while I was pretty sure nothing short of vibranium was going to hold you, I figured it was worth a shot.” 

“You couldn’t have just taken his web stuff and used it yourself?”

Tony shrugs, tries for cavalier. The way Bucky smiles he thinks it might have worked. “I’m big with hands-on experience. Besides, at least now he’s supervised, swinging around with state of the art tech instead of pyjamas.” 

What Tony really needed, as selfish and despicable as he can be at his lowest, was a kid who looked at him like he’d hung the fucking moon. He hadn’t planned on bringing him, not at first, but Peter was starstruck and Tony’d just had his heart broken for the fourth time.

“Another reckless superhero.”

“He used blacked out swimming googles to control his sensory input. It was a problem. He’s just clever enough to be dangerously stupid.”

Bucky nudges him. “He really is your kid then.” 

—

Tony falls asleep in the lab and wakes to the phantom pain of the arc reactor in his chest. He’s gasping for breath, drenched through with sweat, stiff enough to think for a split second that rope is corded across his shoulders, keeping him down. He pats frantically at the front of his shirt, checking for the reactor. His hands fall flat against his skin but he can still feel that heavy, unbearable pressure. 

“Jay,” he gasps. “Am I having - check my heart, is it - “ He can’t breathe. His arc reactor isn’t there and he can’t breathe.

“All signs indicate you’re having a panic attack, boss.” 

It’s her voice that pulls him back. Memories from the battle of New York, from the winter wasteland of Tennessee force their way through the fog of his slowly fading nightmare. He remembers that the arc reactor’s gone, that in its place he has reinforced titanium, light enough that he forgets it’s anything other than bone. The pain is still there though, like a phantom limb. 

“Is Bucky awake?” He asks, before he can really think better of it. 

If FRIDAY answers, he doesn’t hear it. He struggles to regulate his breathing, his hand flat on his chest, trying to rely on pressure to dull the pain. When he finally opens his eyes, Bucky is sitting across from him, knees spread wide on a stool. He’s not wearing shoes and his loose fitting t-shirt is inside-out. 

“You were sleeping,” Tony rasps, taking in every drowsy inch of him.

Bucky shrugs carelessly, before reaching out and tugging Tony’s hand away from his chest. He holds it tightly, as if he hopes it might distract him. It doesn’t.

“Do you still feel it? Your arm?” Tony asks in a rush of breath. “Do you still feel like it’s cut off at the elbow or does the prosthetic make up for it?” 

Bucky rubs absentmindedly at Tony’s hand, tracing his lifeline before holding the pressure point in the heel of his palm. It feels familiar, some Thai massage bullshit, and for a moment that irritates him. He pulls his hand away. 

“If it ever did feel that way, I don’t remember it. It’s been a long time for me. But your reactor,” he gestures at Tony. “It was recent?” 

“Recent enough,” he says, pinching at the bridge of his nose. His breathing still feels shallow. 

“Let me take you upstairs, Tony. You need to sleep and it should be in an actual bed. Muscle tension is only going to make it worse.”

“I’m staying down here,” Tony says abruptly. He’s gone back to rubbing at his chest, though it’s a little more absentminded now. “I just need some vodka.”

“FRIDAY, where’d Tony put the spare blankets.”

“Ottoman,” Tony says, as FRIDAY parrots his answer.

Bucky digs through the ottoman, producing a couple of throws and his half-finished sudoku book. “C’mon,” he says, gesturing him over. “We’re gonna do some puzzles then.” 

Tony watches him for a moment, considering all the ways he could say no. “Fine,” he says. “But just until I can get my head under control and the booze sets in.” 

“Wait,” Bucky says as Tony opens one of the cabinet drawers built into the wall. “Not yet. If you can’t get back to sleep, have a drink then. But not yet.” He takes a seat, leaning on the armrest, tracking every move Tony makes until finally he adds, “Please.” 

Tony’s exhausted and shaky from the adrenaline crash so instead of arguing he gingerly settles in beside him, pulling his feet onto the couch as Bucky reaches over to tuck one of the blankets around his shoulders. He leans back against the cushion, breathing deep.

Bucky is scribbling into the margins of a fresh page and Tony opens his eyes at the sound of his clicky ink pen. He glances down at the book in Bucky’s lap. The puzzles are easy - the numbers instantly slot into place, like they did when he was just a child and Ana would try desperately to keep him still for more than a five minute stretch. He could solve the entire set in the amount of time it takes Bucky to sort through a single row. 

“Five,” Tony says softly, watching as Bucky hesitates over an unfilled box. He thanks him and writes down the answer. 

They continue like this until Tony’s head has drifted onto Bucky’s shoulder and the easy mechanics of the patterns have his eyelids falling shut. He’ll murmur an answer every now and then, when Bucky seems stuck, but otherwise he allows himself to drift. 

“Lay down,” he says softly and Tony’s eyes flutter open. 

“I’m fine,” he says, his mouth dry. “You can stay, it’s fine.”

“I am staying.” Bucky’s smiling, like he’d said just the right thing. “I’m just moving a bit. Lay down.” He readjusts the blanket, pulling it down over Tony’s body while keeping the other one wrapped around his own shoulders like a child’s cape. Bucky sinks to the ground in front of the couch, leaning back so that Tony has a perfect view of the puzzle book from over his shoulder. 

“You don’t have to sit on the ground,” he sighs, but his eyes have already closed again.

“I’ve been worse places,” Bucky assures him.

“Three in the right hand corner,” Tony says through a yawn. 

He doesn’t remember if Bucky finished that one or not. He falls asleep. 

—

“Play pinochle with me,” Bucky says, sitting directly in front of Tony as he bridge shuffles a deck of cards in his hands. 

“Pinochle?” Tony asks, sitting back in his chair. “What am I, an eighty year-old grandmother from Long Island?” 

He knows, distantly, exactly what Bucky is doing. It’s the same technique Rhodey would use in college, coming to Tony with an equation to solve in lieu of whatever pills he was popping after lectures. And it worked sometimes, when he let it anyway - nights spent eating bags of microwave popcorn while they left greasy fingerprints smudged in each other’s notebooks was often a fair trade. It was certainly better than screaming horrible things that he didn’t mean and could never take back while Rhodey physically wrestled a bottle from his hands. 

“Fine,” he agrees, sounding more reluctant than he truly is. “But I demand popcorn.” 

Bucky makes popcorn on the stove, using real butter lifted from the fourth floor kitchen. Steve used to do the same thing, said it reminded him of the street vendors in Brooklyn and his mother on Christmas Eve. Bucky doesn’t remember any of those things, but Tony thinks that it must be encoded somewhere deep in his head, how he and Steve used to split a bag of popcorn for five cents apiece before Bucky’s shift at the docks. 

“Just how Rogers likes it,” Tony says, tossing a handful into his mouth.

“Steve has good taste.”

He hums in disbelief.

“Occasionally,” Bucky amends with a smile. 

They play six rounds, staying up well into the night. Tony falls asleep without even opening the bottle of scotch on his desk. Really, he forgets all about it. 

—

“Sirs,” FRIDAY says over the loud speaker. Bucky glances up from his book and Tony stops mid-rant on the many woes of perfecting nano-technology. “Colonel Rhodes is incoming.”

They glance at each other and Tony says, “Just act causal,” just as Bucky asks, “Should I leave?”

“No, you’re fine, why would I ask you to leave?”

“Why would you ask me to _act casual?_ ” Bucky responds, eyebrows raised.

Tony snorts with laughter as the door opens and Rhodey stumbles to a halt at the lab entrance. “Am I interrupting something?” 

“Nope.” Tony says, spinning in his chair. “Come sit with us. Bucky over there is familiarizing himself with high school level reading material and I’m inventing nano-technology.”

“I’m pretty sure Wakanda already has nano-technology.” Bucky says.

“Re-inventing nano-technology,” Tony amends. “What’s up with you, sugarplum?”

Rhodey clears his throat, looking between them like he’s waiting on the other shoe to drop. “I’m going to D.C. for the next two weeks. I’ll be on secure premises for part of the trip.”

“So no texting during boring meetings?” 

“Probably not.” Rhodey pauses, looking around. “Hey, why is it a hundred fucking degrees in here? I thought you said the heat was bad for the tech.”

Bucky’s head snaps up and Tony waves a hand, saying, “I lied. As if I’d invent anything that couldn’t withstand some lukewarm weather. No, I just didn’t want to give in to your constant complaining over the temperature.”

“Well clearly you gave into _someone’s_ constant complaining over the temperature,” Rhodey says, giving Tony’s chair a half-hearted shove with the heel of his foot that sends him rolling back against the wall.

“Correction, he didn’t complain once, so I adjusted the temperature. What is it you always tell me? You catch more flies with - ”

“God, I’m so glad I’m leaving for two weeks,” he says, toeing at his chair until Tony’s spinning. 

“You’ll miss me,” Tony tells him. Bucky pretends to stay fixated on his book, but he can tell that he’s smiling too. 

—

Tony’s been good all week, the kind of good that even used to keep Pepper off his back. Wine with dinner and a nightcap or two. He only had a splash of rum in his coffee on Tuesday morning before the weekly debrief and besides that there had been no day drinking at all. So when Tony falls off the wagon on Saturday, he falls very hard indeed. 

It started with old schematics, Ultron’s base code accidentally pulled from the depths of his personal servers, a hollowed blueprint that brought back memories of alien-tech, his very worst fears, a future where the world is in danger and he can’t save it. Tony steadies his breathing and makes himself a gin and tonic to take the edge off.

He’s quickly approaching the end of a second bottle of top-shelf Kentucky bourbon and the tesseract is all but forgotten. Tony is laying on the floor of his lab, tossing a ball up into the air and failing to catch it each and every time. DUM-E faithfully retrieves it as it rolls away and Tony watches as the room sways and spins around him.

He’s probably another glass or two from passing out and he welcomes it more than sleep. 

“Boss,” FRIDAY’s voice echoes above him, making him jump. “Peter is calling.”

Tony looks around for a watch, a clock, anything to ground him on the time. He groans, letting his head fall back against the floor. “Tell him I’m busy.” He’s in no shape to talk to the kid, he’s not even confident he’s going to remember any of this in the morning. 

DUM-E rolls back over with the ball and Tony tosses it up in the air, missing it by only a narrow margin this time. “Boss,” FRIDAY says again. “It’s an emergency.”

This has Tony sitting up right faster than he would’ve thought possible, though his stomach rolls at the sudden movement and his head begins to throb. “FRIDAY, contact Rhodey and Pepper and put the calls through when they pick up.” 

“Yes sir.”

“Mr. Stark?” Peters voice is strained as it filters into the lab and Tony thinks he might be sick.

“Hey kiddo,” he says, projecting as loud as he can with his head tucked between his knees. “What’s going on?”

He waves his hand to mute the mics and says, “Fri, has Rhodey answered?”

“Colonel Rhodes has not answered. He is likely out of service right now, boss. He has been in a secure location in Washington D.C. since Thursday.” 

Tony lets out a strangled, desperate sound, while Peter continues to fumble through an explanation of an attempted robbery in Elmhurst. “Then get Bucky down here, now.”

“And well, then I was shot,” Peter says, and he chuckles a little. It sounds forced. “It’s okay really, it’s fine, it hurts a lot. But I’m worried because, well I’m losing blood. I think it should stop, I just don’t know when ‘cause I’ve never been shot before.” He sounds a little hysterical and Tony could gag with fear. His kid is bleeding on the streets of fucking Queens and Tony is too drunk to even stand. 

“And I don’t want to go to the hospital,” he continues. “I mean I can’t exactly go to a hospital, right? They’ll know it’s me and I know how to take care of a stab wound Mr. Stark but I think - I can’t really tell but maybe the bullets are still there and what if I start to heal around them?”

Tony barely registers the door of his lab sliding open and a hand on his shoulder as Peter’s voice whispers, “Mr. Stark?”

“Sir,” FRIDAY says. “I’m putting Ms. Potts through.”

“Peter, Tony, are you there?” 

“Hi Ms. Potts. I’m sorry - I just - “

“FRIDAY said you were injured, Peter? You were shot?” Pepper asks, cutting him off.

“Yeah.” 

Tony is still struggling to find his voice when Bucky crouches down in front of him, looking carefully into his eyes. “You’re drunk,” he mouths and Tony nods his head. 

Bucky sets a bracing hand against Tony’s shoulder, holding him steady just as Pepper says, “You can absolutely go to a hospital, Peter. We’ll help protect your identity. You need to tell me where you are so we can notify them in advance.” 

“Elmhurst,” Peter says. “But the east end. I don’t - I’m not - ”

“Elmhurst is fine, Peter. New York Presbyterian has a hospital in Flushing. Do you think you can make it there? It’s just next to the botanical garden.”

In the moment it takes for Peter to answer, Tony gasps, “I’ll send a suit. Pete, I’ll send a suit. FRIDAY will know where to find you. It’ll get you there.”

Peter makes a shaky sound of agreement as Bucky pulls him to his feet, pressing a water bottle into his hands. “You get that Fri?”

“Yes sir. Iron Legion has been deployed. ETA sixteen minutes.”

“Tony,” Pepper says, and he knows immediately that she is going to tear him apart once this is over. “Stay on the line with him. I’m going to call NYP. Peter, darling, I’ll make sure they’re waiting for you at the emergency room entrance, okay? You’ll have a private room and you don’t have to take off your mask if you don’t want to, you don’t even need to speak to them. But I want you to know that I will make sure anyone who helps treat you is made very aware of their confidentiality obligations.”

“Okay,” Peter whispers and Pepper’s line disconnects from the call. “Mr. Stark. I’m not a big fan of hospitals.”

“I know kiddo, I know.” Tony stumbles towards the door. “But I’ll be there soon, okay? I’m gonna call a suit, Fri’s gonna call aunt May, everything’s gonna be fine.”

“You’re not flying,” Bucky whispers into his ear, grabbing his elbow. “You can barely stand. You’ll black out the second you get to altitude.” 

“Boss,” FRIDAY says as Tony wrenches himself from Bucky’s grip. “Mrs. Parker would like to speak to Peter.”

“Alright Pete,” Tony says, leaning against the wall for support. “I’m gonna put aunt May through and drop off for a minute so I can track the suit. It’ll pick you up and then straight to the ER you’ll go. Pep has everything taken care of and I’ll be there soon.”

“How soon?” Peter asks. His voice has a light and airy quality to it that makes Tony think he may be close to passing out. 

“Soon, bud. You wanna talk to May?”

“Yeah.”

“Alright, Fri. Put her through. Stay on the line but keep us both muted. Pull up Peter’s vitals, put them on every screen no matter what room I’m in. Unmute if he asks for me.”

“Tony,” Bucky says softly, watching as he jams his finger into the elevator buttons, despite FRIDAY’s silent intervention that has them headed straight for Tony’s floor.

He makes it as far as the kitchen, watching Peter’s heart rate crawl as he passes the television, and drinks the entire water bottle Bucky had handed him in just a few breaths. He stands still, bracing himself, before throwing it all back up into the sink. He’s sweating and shaking, but he opens the fridge and reaches for another. Purging is a hell of a lot easier with something in his stomach.

“You’re not flying,” Bucky says, running a comforting hand down the middle of Tony’s back where his shirt is damp and sticking to his skin. 

“Yes I am. Taking a chopper. Slower than a suit, but it’ll work.” It’s with years of practice from a pill addiction that Tony sticks his fingers into the back of his throat, keeping his tongue flat, and forces himself to vomit again. He coughs through the burning in his chest, barely registering Bucky’s hand as it continues to stroke his back.

“Boss,” FRIDAY says. “The suit has retrieved Peter. They will be at New York Presbyterian Hospital, Queens within two minutes.” 

“May?” He asks, spitting into the sink one last time and reaching for a hand towel to wipe down his face and neck.

“She is in a cab, approximately thirteen minutes.”

“Let’s make it nine. Can you take care of the lights?”

“Yes, sir. The chopper is ready on helipad four.”

“You need me to fly it?” Bucky asks, following him closely, like he’s ready to catch Tony at a moment’s notice.

“No, it’s auto-pilot. But I’d like,” he’s too drunk for this and he can feel himself starting to unravel, coming apart at the seams. “I need you to come with me.”

“Okay,” Bucky says. “Let’s go.”

—

The forty minute flight into the city is nowhere near enough time to get sober and certainly not to the extent he needs to be, to comfort and take care of a kid he feels some sort of de facto responsibility for. 

“I’m a fucking mess,” he breathes, because he is - so fucking drunk on a Saturday night that he could barely even answer Peter’s call. 

“But you’re working on it,” Bucky says. He’s sitting beside him, not across, and their thighs are pressed together. He nudges Tony’s shoulder every time he stops nursing the water bottle cradled in his hands. 

“I’m really not.”

“No? Well I’m pretty sure you will be, after this.” Bucky rests his hand on Tony’s knee and it grounds him in a way that he would rebel against if the world weren’t still swaying like a storm at sea. 

“I’m barely keeping it together,” he admits, as if it’s not something Bucky can see just from looking. But somehow it makes him feel better to say it out loud. 

“Barely is better than nothing.”

“Is it?” He whispers. 

“Yeah.” His fingers squeeze gently. “Trust me on this one.” 

—

They touch down on the medevac landing pad, not even pausing to cut the engine while Tony stumbles down the fold-out stairs with Bucky’s hand tight around his upper arm. They don’t make it to the door before it’s taking off again.

“Guess we’re driving home,” Bucky says once they’re safely in the stairwell, out of reach of the ear-splitting rush of the chopper taking flight. 

“We’ll take off from midtown or LaGuardia. Can’t keep a medevac spot in case a call comes in.” Tony says absentmindedly. He stops, suddenly overwhelmed by the idea that somewhere in this building Peter Parker is bleeding from a gunshot wound. “Bullets,” he reminds himself.

“What?”

“He said _bullets._ He was shot more than once.” 

“Tony.” Bucky says his name like he has something to be sympathetic towards, like Tony isn’t to blame for every minute of this whole fucking nightmare. 

“Don’t,” he says, pulling away from Bucky’s grip. It doesn’t seem to deter him. “Let’s just go, let’s find Peter.”

They just make it to the lobby when they’re intercepted by Pepper’s PA, a young man in a paisley button down whose name Tony never was able to remember. He thinks it must be Justin or maybe Jeffrey. He looks far too composed for a midnight call from the office. Tony instantly hates him for it.

“Mr. Parker is just leaving surgery. He’s in recovery and he’ll be transferred to a private suite within the hour. Ms. Potts asked that I bring you straight there to wait.”

“Give me the room number and I’ll meet you there. Tony needs more water and something to eat,” Bucky says, still guiding him down the hall with a light hand to his middle back, like he’s wary of letting him walk without something to lean against. 

“I don’t want anything, I’m fine. Let’s just go,” Tony says, but Bucky quiets him with a soft touch to the nape of his neck. 

“I can get something for each of you, if you’d like.” 

“No need,” Bucky says. Pepper’s PA nods his head and dutifully rattles off the floor and corresponding suite number. 

Bucky leans in to whisper, “Peter’s fine, but if _you_ want to be fine when the kid wakes up, you need something in your stomach.” He’s close enough that his nose nearly brushes Tony’s temple. 

Tony glares at Bucky over his shoulder the second he pulls away, though he suspects he doesn’t even stick around long enough to see it. “Alright, Jack, where to?”

“It’s Jeremy,” he says agreeably, leading him to the elevator. “Ms. Potts requested that you contact her immediately once you get in.”

“You call her Ms. Potts?” Tony asks. 

“Of course.”

Tony makes a sound of polite interest. “I’ll be sure to call Ms. Potts, then.”

“Right. I also have a change of clothes for you and a toiletries bag, if you’d like. Ms. Potts requested that I bring them from the office. She expected you’d be,” he pauses, clearly trying for the most subtle interpretation of what Tony is sure Pepper shouted over the phone. “More comfortable,” he decides on. 

“You mean she thought I’d come in smelling like I’ve been day drinking since noon?”

“Not my words, sir,” Jeremy says.

Tony waves him off. “It’s fine. Though for the record I didn’t start drinking until around three. I wasn’t even awake at noon.”

—

He can see May from the doorway, dressed in flannel pyjama pants and waiting in a chair beside Peter’s empty bed. Despite his new change of clothes and his freshly washed face, Tony is still afraid to step inside knowing that she’s going to take one look at his bloodshot eyes and hate him for what he’s done to her kid.

“Come on,” Bucky says softly in his ear, appearing at his side without a sound, carrying a cup of black coffee with a few bottles of water cradled in the other hand. “It’ll be fine.”

May looks up as they enter the room and she rushes to hug Tony, gasping every detail about Peter’s injuries that she’d been able to wheedle out of the staff. “He did have one bullet that stuck in his shoulder, but he was only nicked below his waist and on his thigh by the other two.”

Tony’s not sure he can hear any more of this right now without throwing up bile, but thankfully Bucky steps in not a moment later to guide them both towards the chairs, insisting they sit. He hands them each a bottle of water and shoves a banana into Tony’s hand. 

When he insists he’s really not hungry, Bucky levels him with a stare that could have put Rhodey to shame. “You need something in your stomach, Tony. It’s going to help.”

“I’m sorry,” May says. “I haven’t introduced myself.”

Bucky turns to her, transforming in an instant into the man who supposedly charmed half of Brooklyn into his bed. “You’re Peter’s aunt. I’ve heard so much about you that no introduction is needed. I’m Bucky Barnes - a friend of Tony’s.”

Tony notices for the first time that his hair is pulled back with a black hair tie, the kind he asked FRIDAY to order in bulk months ago. 

“Yeah,” she says, looking a little dazed. “I’ve heard about you too.” Despite her usually impeccable manners, her eyes dart down to the metal hand that is visible beneath the cuff of Bucky’s sleeve. 

Bucky smiles, pretending not to see May’s reluctance, and says, “Can I get you anything from the cafeteria? They still have fruit left, some granola bars.”

“No, no, I’m alright.” May waves him off. “I just ate a few hours ago, technically. Late shift.” 

There are only two chairs in the room, so Bucky stands behind Tony, his hands settled on his shoulders as he leans down to murmur, “You’d better eat that before I make you.” 

“Kinky,” Tony says on instinct before turning to May. “Any word on when he’ll be out of recovery?” 

“Soon,” she says. “They’ve been trying to wake him, last I heard. But don’t worry, they’ll tell us right away.”

Tony nods his head and they lapse into a kind of comfortable silence. The alcohol and the adrenaline crash quickly lure him into a shallow sleep. He can feel May watching them, at first, can tell that she’s taking in the Winter Solider and his loose fitting clothes and his voice as he ducks down to whisper, “I’ll wake you when he’s out.” He knows she’s comparing all of this to the news stories, the things Peter’s told her, the things _Tony_ has told her.

He falls asleep anyway and opens his eyes to Bucky’s thumb at the base of his skull, rubbing out the crick that’s already starting to form in his neck. His eyes flutter open and the seat beside him is empty. “May?” He croaks. He still feels drunk, unsteady, but he’s certainly passing into the start of hungover. 

“She’s gone to talk to the doctor. They’re bringing him in soon. Here,” he hands Tony a little single-dose packet of Advil and a bottle of what looks like Pedialyte. “Take the meds and get some fluids in you. It’ll help with the hangover.” 

“Are you kidding me with this?” He mumbles, groaning appreciatively as Bucky continues to idly work the tension out of his neck.

“No. You’re dehydrated.”

“I need coffee.” He blinks the sleep from his eyes, wishing FRIDAY was here to dim the lights. 

“Coffee is a diuretic. Drink half of this and I’ll get you another coffee.”

“Another?”

“You fell asleep before you could drink the one I originally brought for you.” Bucky lets go of his shoulder and appears suddenly in his line of sight, kneeling on the floor in front of him like he’s checking for something. “Well. You look like shit, but not bad enough that anyone’s gonna notice.”

“Thanks, cupcake,” he grumbles, half-heartedly swallowing a mouthful of the Pedialyte. “This is disgusting.”

“Blue seemed like the safest option.”

Tony groans in response. 

“I spoke to Rhodes, by the way. He was worried when he saw you called.” 

“Shit,” Tony says, scrubbing a hand over his face.

“But I’ve kept him up to date, been writing him and all. He’s heading back first thing tomorrow.” Bucky says this all matter-of-fact, like he’s giving a report, a status update.

“At ease, solider,” Tony says. “I get it, you’re super capable. If you wanted me to kiss you that bad, all you really had to do was take your top off.”

Bucky smiles and reaches up for just a moment to brush his thumb along Tony’s jaw line. “I’ll go check on May. Half of that blue thing better be gone when I get back.”

—

Peter is still fast asleep when they finally transfer him. Pepper had called the medical unit at the compound to advise on the dosage and combination of painkillers needed to create a drip that had a snowball’s chance of working with Peter’s metabolism. 

“It may have worked too well,” the doctor admits, watching as the nurses lift him onto the bed and begin hooking up the heart and blood oxygen monitors. “He should have been awake about an hour ago. We’re not worried though, he just needs to sleep it off.”

Bucky asks all the right questions, healing time and recovery, but Tony and May are too busy succumbing to the exact same instinct to have their hands somewhere on Peter’s body. They’ve perched themselves on either side of his bed and Tony scoops up his left hand while May runs her fingers over Peter’s cheeks and smooths back his hair. 

“He’s alright, Tony.” She says, not taking her eyes off Peter’s face.

Tony is still pretty drunk so he presses his lips to Peter’s knuckles, safe with the knowledge that the only other person who can see him loves Peter Parker just as much as he does.

“The doctor said he was very talkative when they first brought him in. Didn’t even need a transfusion. The only difficult part was figuring out the anaesthetics.” Bucky says, shutting the door with barely a click.

“Yeah,” May sighs. She eventually forces herself off the bed, pausing to stretch. She moves to reach for her chair, but Bucky beats her to it, grabbing one in each hand and setting them both close enough to Peter’s bed so that Tony and May can still reach out and feel him breathing.

“Such good manners,” she says, smiling, but even then she looks exhausted.

“Don’t encourage him,” Tony mumbles, though he still leans back into Bucky’s hand when he guides him to sit. 

“I know everything’s fine,” she says suddenly, tilting her head back and rubbing at her eyes. “But I also know this is going to happen again and again until one day - ”

“It’s not,” Tony says, interrupting her. “First of all, you better bet as soon as I get back to the compound I’ll be starting on some suit improvements. And even if something does happen, something like this that I can’t prevent, I’ll be damn sure we’re not caught out again with a medical team that knows next to nothing about enhanced kids. I’ll make sure there’s an entire staff on payroll in each borough, two in Queens, stocks of pain killers that’ll work but not knock him out like this - grand plans, May. Grand plans.”

May doesn’t answer him for a moment. She runs her fingers idly up and down the pale skin of Peter’s forearm. “I’m glad you’re here,” she says finally. 

Peter looks so young sometimes, especially when he sleeps, like he might be all of thirteen years old. “Me too,” he says.

—

Peter wakes a handful of times - once while May is out stretching her legs and grabbing some orange juice from the cafeteria, and once when a nurse adjusts his IV.

“Woah,” he says, looking at Tony with glassy eyes. “Is this what it feels like to do drugs?”

“Depends on the drug,” he tells him with a wink. 

“Tony,” May snaps from the doorway. 

“What?” He asks, turning. “It’s true.”

Bucky had already wandered off to pick up a tablet from Pepper’s assistant and to do however many laps of the hospital his poor, paranoid brain required of him. He wishes he’d hurry back, because it’s hard enough to sit by Peter’s bedside while he drifts in and out of sleep, harder still without anything to occupy his hands.

“You need a break?” She asks, eyeing Tony sympathetically. 

“No, he’s fine.” Peter says for him and Tony laughs.

“That’s not your decision to make, Peter Parker.”

“No, but I _am_ fine, May. I’ll go for coffee when the kid passes out again,” Tony assures her in a stage whisper. 

“I’m not gonna pass out,” Peter mumbles defiantly, though he slurs his words a little, and his grip weakens in Tony’s hand.

“Sure thing, itsy bitsy. You just rest those eyes a minute.” 

—

Tony spends the first few hours of daylight asleep with his head resting on the edge of Peter’s hospital bed, his arms pillowed beneath him. When he finally does wake, it’s to Peter saying, “I’m pretty sure you’re drooling on my bedspread, Mr. Stark.”

He groans in response, peaking one eye open before squeezing them both shut again. “Why is it so fucking bright in here? And where’s May?”

“She went home to shower, she said she’d only be an hour or so.”

Tony’s back is acting every one of his forty-six years as he sits up, feeling for all the world like he got into a fist fight and lost. “Jesus,” he mumbles. 

“You think you’d be used to it, considering all the times I found you asleep like this in the lab,” Peter chirps. “But I guess age waits on no one.”

“You’re well enough to be a little brat, I see.” Peter grins and Tony wants to sing for how normal he looks, bright eyed and restless. 

“I’ve been using your tablet while you’ve been sleeping. Want it back?” 

“Nah, I’m gonna go grab a coffee and powder my nose.” He stands, stumbling for just a moment, but he covers it with a sleepy groan and a full body stretch.

“MJ says that ‘powder my nose’ is a euphemism for using cocaine.”

“Pretty sure it’s a reference powder rooms, but sure thing kiddo. I’ll be back in two shakes.”

“Two shakes of what?” Peter shouts after him and Tony smiles, rolling his eyes as he follows signs for the cafeteria. 

He tries to keep his head down as he orders two coffees, leaving a generous tip for the cafeteria workers, but as it stands he has nothing to worry about. The only other people in the canteen are the exhausted families and loved ones of patients, milling about like they’re in something of a trance. No one recognizes him, or if they do, no one has the heart to say anything about it.

He pauses outside of Peter’s door when he hears his voice. He no longer sounds as cheerful. If anything he’s a bit wary when he says, “You’re Mr. Barnes. You’re the guy who didn’t cave in Mr. Stark’s chest.”

“Well,” Bucky begins and Tony can tell by the pitch of his voice that he’s trying not to smile. “By that measure, almost everyone is the guy who didn’t cave in Mr. Stark’s chest.”

“Except for Steve Rogers.” There’s an edge to Peter’s voice that Tony rarely hears. Even when he’s Spiderman, on those nights where Tony is brave enough to pull up footage from his suit, he’s always flippant and light as if he might be persuaded to dole out some second chances with no more than an honest apology.

“To be fair,” Tony says, stepping through the door and presenting Bucky with one of the coffee cups. “My chest has garnered a lot of attention over the years. It’s really not the worst thing that’s happened to it.” That’s a lie, actually, because he’s not sure anything can be worse than that split second when he thought Captain fucking America was going to be the one to finally kill him. 

“Ugh, Mr. Stark. Stop talking about your chest.”

“You know what? You’re stuck here, doctor’s orders, and that means you have to listen to whatever it is I wanna talk about.”

“Mr. Barnes.” Peter turns his doe eyes on Bucky. “Save me. I bet you’re strong enough to kick him out of my room.”

“Strong enough, yes,” he says. “Not nearly dumb enough.”

Tony returns to the free chair at Bucky’s side. “Agree to disagree.”

“Rude,” Bucky responds, snapping off the lid of his cup.

“Stop, you’re not a Millennial.” 

“Well,” Peter begins. “Technically - “

“Don’t even,” Tony says. “Mess around on your tablet, Gen Z, I’m going to enjoy this cup of coffee in absolute silence.” 

“No way! I’m the sick one.”

“You’re not sick,” Tony says, but Peter’s already talking over him. 

“And I have so many questions for Mr. Barnes.”

“Bucky,” he corrects him.

“For Mr. Bucky,” Peter says. 

“I already regret bringing you with me,” Tony says, turning to look at him. His eyes linger for a moment and he hopes Bucky knows just how fucking thankful he is to have him in arm’s reach.

“Sure you do,” Bucky murmurs into the rim of his cup. 

—

They release Peter from the hospital before the sun even goes down. May signs him out and Tony catches a glimpse of a few S.I. lawyers milling about. Pepper shows up just in time to see Peter off, giving him a hug and greeting May with a kiss to each cheek.

“We should leave now,” Tony play whispers into Bucky’s ear. “Or she will actually kill me. I’ll be dead and you’ll have no one interesting left to talk to in the whole of the ouch - “ Pepper grabs his upper arm with her truly prophetic grip strength and he can feel her nails through the sleeves of his henley. 

“Sargent Barnes,” she says in her most polite business casual. “Do you mind giving us just a moment?”

“Don’t!” Tony says frantically. “She will, at a minimum, maim me beyond recognition.”

“Well,” Bucky says, patting his other shoulder. “I’m sure you’ll deserve it. I’ll be at the west exit.”

Pepper waits a full five seconds to make sure no one is lingering outside the door before hissing, “I cannot _believe_ you, Tony. FRIDAY estimated your blood alcohol level was point-two-three if not higher and what if I hadn’t picked up? I almost didn’t, you know, I nearly slept through it, but - ”

“Pep,” he says softly, reaching for her hands as she gestures wildly. “You are absolutely right.”

“Wait, what?” She stops, looking at him closely. 

“You are absolutely, as always, one hundred percent right. So this morning I had FRIDAY instruct the staff to get rid of every drop of alcohol in the whole of the compound. There’s not even cooking wine left.”

“Oh,” she whispers.

“This was the line. I crossed it and I put you and Bucky in a terrible position and I’m so sorry that I did that to you.”

Pepper looks away. “You’ve put me in worse.”

Tony leans up to kiss her cheek. “I know. And I love you. And I’m sorry.”

“I love you too.” She pauses to steady herself, smoothing her hair back into place. “So you’re really going to quit again?”

“I’m going to try.”

“Alright. Good. That’s really good,” she sighs. “Well, your shadow is waiting on you. You’d better go get him.” She’s smiling in that way that reminds Tony that she is always, always two steps ahead. 

“Right. See you soon, Pep.”

—

Bucky is asleep the moment they take off and Tony wonders just how long he’s been awake. He’s afraid to ask FRIDAY, afraid she’ll tell him that he spent the past thirty-six hours cleaning up after him without a moment’s rest. Instead he texts Rhodey, assures him that Peter’s fine and finishes off with a flourish of: _I had all alcohol removed from the compound, including your private store. So if you want to keep scotch on hand in the future it had better be well hidden._

It’s a few minutes before Rhodey writes back. _I’m so fucking proud of you. Don’t disappoint me._

He always disappoints Rhodey, one way or another. But Tony really hopes he doesn’t this time. 

The second they land and the engine cuts, Bucky is startled awake by the silence. Tony sits watching him, unsure of what to say.

“You alright?” Bucky asks blearily, blinking sleep from his eyes. 

“Yeah,” Tony says. “Hey, I know you totally disappeared in the middle of the night and Rogers is going to think I kidnapped you for nefarious purposes and he’s probably prowling the lower levels as we speak trying to hunt me down - but do you wanna go up to mine and order dinner and fall asleep watching _Aliens_?”

Bucky grins. “Sure do.”

“Great. Let’s do that.”

—

Rhodey has a guilt complex that could compete with Tony’s on a good day, so he spends an entire weekend flittering between the lab and the penthouse sitting room, rarely leaving his side. 

“We need a way to get FRIDAY through the black box offices in D.C.,” Rhodey says, snatching the popcorn bowl from Tony’s hands.

“Already on it,” he says. “But again, I had it handled.”

“Pepper had it handled and to everyone’s surprise _Barnes_ had it handled. You had nothing handled.”

“True,” Tony says through a mouthful of popcorn. “Though it didn’t surprise me, you know, that Bucky had everything under control. He’s pretty competent for a brainwashed super solider.” He nudges Rhodey’s shoulder with his own. “How’d you get out, anyway? I thought you were meant to be gone through Sunday.”

“Family emergency,” he admits, with a bit of a rueful smile. 

Tony laughs. “So they know you were just coming to dig me out of something, huh?”

“Definitely.”

They’re silent for a moment, the sound of the television humming low between them. Tony takes a breath, unsure of what he’s going to say up until the point when he opens his mouth and the words suddenly start tumbling out. “Would now be a good time to tell you that I kind of want to fuck him? Bucky, that is. Maybe worse than that actually, I kind of want to like,” he swallows. “Wake up next to him and let him touch my hair and - ”

“What the _fuck_?” 

“Let me also remind you that of my sexual and not-so-sexual fantasies this one is almost my least destructive.”

“Is it?” He asks, sounding a touch hysterical. “Because I watched that man pull the trigger of a hand gun at point blank range - “ 

“That wasn’t technically his fault.”

“Shut up, Tony. Just - Jesus. I can deal with you being friends, I can - “ He hunches in on himself, rubbing at the top of his head with both hands. “But sharing a bed with the guy, that’s not - “

“To be fair, I don’t know that he actually wants to share a bed with me, so to speak,” Tony says.

“Oh please. He _absolutely_ wants to fuck you. You’d need to be Steve Rogers not to see that. I was just hoping _you_ hadn’t seen it and I could be spared the stress of watching you try to seduce the Winter Solider.”

Tony taps his fingers against his ankle, their movie long forgotten. “I introduced him to Peter,” he says softly. “Not by choice technically, but I knew they’d have to meet when I asked him to come to the hospital with me. Close enough, in any event. He called him Mr. Bucky. Pete recounted the entire plot of _Terminator_ and Bucky actually listened. He asked clarifying questions on the plot. Peter showed him photos of all the cast members on his phone.” 

“Jesus Christ, Tones. If Barnes doesn’t strangle you in your fucking sleep, Rogers will.”

“First of all, Rogers isn’t exactly his bestie anymore. Long story, I’ll explain later. Second, I’m fairly confident that any strangling in this relationship would be fully consensual.” 

Rhodey groans loudly into his hands. “I take it back. I’m going to kill you myself.”

“Hey,” Tony says, nudging his thigh with his foot. “I gave you that chance back at MIT and you, quote, didn’t swing that way and had no interest in tying me to the bedposts in our twin-sized dorm room. End quote. So no use crying over spilled milk.”

—

Tony waits until each hologram has flickered off and the Avengers have slowly started to their feet before he makes his announcement. 

“A bit of housekeeping, if you don’t mind, before you all step out for brunch or whatever equally trendy mid-morning plans you might have. Starting last week, there will no longer be alcohol available in the compound. If you really want to let your hair down, there are a number of establishments that will sell you whatever spirits your little hearts’ desire within a few miles of the perimeter. If you wish to bring anything back, please keep it to your rooms, limited to the fourth floor. Anyway - much appreciated.”

He expects some backlash and despite his newly sober status, or maybe because of it, he’s still a fucking coward so he pulls the door open and bows himself out.

“Thanks for the heads up,” Sam calls after him, and Tony almost stumbles on his way down the hall.

“Yeah, no problem.” He says with a backwards wave, before disappearing into the stairwell. He doesn’t want to risk waiting on the elevator and overhearing the inevitable chatter. It’s a few extra flights, but he could use the exercise. 

Tony collapses onto the couch the second he makes it through the lab and lies there with a pillow over his face until he hears the door open. “How much complaining was there?” He asks, his voice muffled. 

Bucky gently pulls the pillow from his grip and smiles down at him from where he sits perched on the arm of the sofa. “No complaining, because if there had been, I wouldn’t be here right now. I’d be busy conducting very public eviscerations.”

“Oh yeah? You gave them Winter Solider eyes so no one would shit talk me?”

“No,” Bucky says, ruffling his hair in a way that makes Tony scowl and scramble to fix it. “Sam was the one giving everyone the stink eye. He’s a counselor, you know, for soldiers. I think he understands better than anyone else in this building what it is you’re going through. But yes,” he says, shoving Tony aside and settling beside him on the couch. “I would’ve gone full Winter Solider if the situation called for it. Lucky for us both, it didn’t.” 

Tony is exhausted. The effort it takes to stay sober cannot be overstated. It’s harder than open heart surgery twice over, harder than building the Iron Man suit. It’s the one and only thing he needs to do now, his most important job, and it lingers. Perhaps the worst part is that it will always linger.

He slumps forward, selfishly heavy on Bucky’s shoulder. “I think I’m ready for a nap, to be honest.”

“Then take a nap,” Bucky says into his hair. “I’m most of the way through an Agatha Christie book anyway. I’ll wake you up, after a while.”

“Yeah,” he mumbles, letting Bucky adjust them both. “That sounds good.”

—

For the first week, two, three, Tony feels every second of it like sand through an hourglass. He looks down at the handprints on his metal work table, perfect outlines of heat from where he was pressing hard enough for his wrists to ache. Sometimes he envies that super-soldier strength, how they can just crumble steel at the slightest touch. 

Bucky sits beside him, a novel balanced on his lap. “Teach me something,” He says finally, like he can hear Tony’s breathing start to hitch.

“What?” He rubs at his eyes with the heels of his palms, warding off the ache of something worse. 

“Teach me about science,” he repeats, snapping his book closed. “I was always real interested in it, you know. Science and mathematics, but they didn’t really teach more than letters in school, not like I’d remember much besides even if they did. But I’d like to learn, if you don’t mind.”

“You trying to distract me, Buck?” He asks, his voice strained. 

“A little bit,” he admits. “But it’s also something I’d enjoy. Remember that time you told me about your hydropower turbine?” 

Tony nods, though he only remembers bits and pieces through the hazy memory of alcohol. 

“Well I read all about it afterwards, with FRIDAY’s help. I learned about kinetic energy and tidal stream generators.” He ducks his head a moment, like he might’ve said too much and Tony smiles despite himself. “Anyway,” Bucky continues, clearing his throat. “I might not have much of a mind for it all, but I’d like to try.”

“I’ve seen you fight,” Tony says. “Seen you shoot. You’re probably a natural with geometric theory, even if you can’t put words to it. And well - ” He sighs. His handprints have disappeared. “Why not?”

They start with trigonometry, which Bucky breezes through after the smallest measure of guidance, solving Tony’s hand-drawn problems with a flick of the stylus he had to dig out of a storage box. 

“You are good at math,” Tony says, his chin propped up on his hand. He’s not surprised, but he is strangely proud. “You’re gonna catch up in no time. Let’s do a little science to balance you out. Know what an atom’s made of?”

“No,” he says. “But you can tell me while I make pasta.”

Tony squints at him. “Carbonara?” 

“Did you remember to add cheese to FRIDAY’s grocery order this time?”

“Probably?”

Bucky smiles, shaking his head. “Carbonara, then.”

—

He’s been working on a suit that’ll sit comfortably between nano-tech and the flexible synthetics that Peter favors. Kevlar is too much of an insulator to work into his new design and Tony needs his kid bullet-proof. He has a few ideas. 

Bucky is situated in his usual spot and Tony’s lost track of how long it’s been when Peter finally arrives.

“Hey, Mr. Stark. Bucky boy.”

Tony spins around in his chair, his hands held up in feigned outrage. “ _Bucky boy_?”

“Playing around with some nicknames,” Peter says, slinging his backpack off his shoulder. 

“Technically Bucky is already a nickname,” he says idly from where he sits perched on the couch with a paperback copy of _Gone with the Wind_. They both ignore him.

“So Bucky gets nicknames, but I’m still Mr. Stark?” He asks, incredulous. 

“Well, yeah. Calling you anything else is just weird.” 

“Like calling your dad by his first name,” Bucky adds.

“Exactly, buckshot.” 

“I’m drawing the line at buckshot,” he says, turning a page.

“That’s okay,” Peter says, settling in over Tony’s shoulder to peer down at the suit design. “I’ve loads more. Oh hey - that’s super cool. Can you zoom in?” 

“Here,” Tony says, passing the holo-screen over to Peter. “Have at it. Needs your feedback at this point anyway. Hey, Bucky, you wanna work on balancing chem equations again?”

Peter whirls around, watching as Tony takes a seat next to Bucky on the couch. “Are you teaching Bucky chemistry?”

“Kind of,” he admits.

He plays offended, a hand pressed to his chest, but Tony thinks there’s a hint of genuine disbelief in that pout. “You’re teaching Bucky chemistry, and you didn’t think to involve me, the _chemistry expert_?” 

“Alright,” Tony says, kicking his feet up onto the ottoman. “Expert seems excessive. You’re sixteen. Besides, we’re scratching middle school level here, kiddo. It’s not exactly your scene.”

“And it’s not just chemistry,” Bucky says, gesturing at the stack of notebooks he insists on using now instead of a tablet. “We’ve done trigonometry, some biology - “

“Barely any biology,” Tony clarifies. “It’s basically a soft-science.”

“Tell that to Dr. Cho,” Peter says with a grin. 

“I will not be telling that to Dr. Cho and neither will you,” Tony says, pointing at him threateningly. 

“Chemistry’s alright,” Bucky continues. “But I like the math problems more.”

Tony grins at him. “A man after my own heart.”

“Gross, Mr. Stark.” 

Tony waives him off. “Look at the suit designs and actually pay attention to them because we’re going into testing after this. I don’t want you coming back to me in two weeks with something that could’ve been solved in the draft phase. Buck - hand me your pen.”

“I can help. I was a tutor at school!!” Peter insists, somehow more distracted by Bucky’s makeshift lessons than the bespoke tech made just for him at an obscene marginal cost. 

“Teenagers,” Tony sighs as he begins scribbling out chemistry equations on the lined paper, allowing him enough room to show his work. It reminds him, for just a moment, of his mother. “You can help after you’ve given me feedback on the suit, kid. Now get to it. Never thought I’d have to work so hard to get you to look over my tech - I really must be losing my touch.” 

“Or I just like spending time with you,” Peter says, sticking out his tongue in retaliation. 

“Pete,” Tony begins, pinching the bridge of his nose as Bucky takes his notebook and begins writing.

“Alright, alright. I’m doing it. Geeze, Mr. Stark.”

—

There hasn’t been a surveillance flag from FRIDAY in months. This is probably due in part to Bucky’s semi-permanent status as a fixture in his lab and Steve’s recent trips abroad to act as a liaison alongside Rhodey. So when Tony kicks back with a cup of coffee at ten o’clock at night and he sees the little flashing red marker on his holo-screen, he doesn’t immediately remember what the flag could be for.

The second he sees Bucky and Steve sitting stiffly across from each other in the fourth floor common room, Tony knows he should stop watching. Every inch of moral fibre he’s ever had is straining because this can’t possibly serve a purpose anymore. His finger hovers over the edge of the screen, but he hesitates as Steve begins to speak.

“I haven’t seen much of you lately.” Steve sounds, for maybe the first time, a little lost. His carefully sculpted conviction has fallen away, and Tony’s a little surprised that there’s anything left underneath. 

“You’ve been busy,” Bucky says easily. 

“And you’re practically living with Tony.” 

Tony leans back in his chair. “Well that didn’t take long,” he says to himself. He hears FRIDAY hum in agreement.

“Sometimes, he’s working on my arm,” Bucky says, which is a bold-faced a lie and Tony’s almost impressed by his delivery. “But usually I just like his company.”

Steve leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. He’s looking intensely at the carpet, like he can’t quite meet Bucky’s steady gaze. 

“I guess you really are a different guy, huh. I’m not sure my Bucky would’ve liked Tony very much.”

“No?” Bucky asks. “I might not be the man you grew up with, but I still remember what he was like. And I recall him being awful impressed by Howard’s inventions, by all the amazing things he dreamed up.”

“Howard’s not Tony.”

“No,” he agrees. “He’s not. Howard was a cold warrior, he toed the party line. He devoted his life to advancing his country’s interests by any means necessary.”

“Advancement of all mankind,” Steve says, like he’s parroting something he’s heard a hundred times before. 

“And Tony’s downstairs right now, with a teenager from Queens, working on some kind of hoverboard the kid got excited over.”

“The Spider-Glider,” Tony tells FRIDAY with a smile, as if she doesn’t already have six drafts of schematics stored away. 

“And he tells that kid every day that he’s brilliant and he listens to him talk about the girl he has a crush on. He made him hologram flashcards to help with his history tests and picked out his suit for prom night.”

“Bucky,” Steve sighs. “I’m not - maybe Howard wasn’t cut out to be a parent, but - ”

“That’s not the point,” Bucky says softly. He stands, but pauses at Steve’s side, gently squeezing his shoulder. “We can all be more than one thing, these days. Tony can save the world in a metal suit, he can revolutionize anything he gets his hands on, but he can also love an orphaned kid with his whole damn heart. You can be a few things too, you know. You don’t just need to be Captain America.” 

“What if that’s all I can be?” Steve whispers, so softly that the mic barely picks it up.

“It’s not,” Bucky says. “You know it’s not.”

“Well. That settles it.” Tony waves off the monitor and sighs up at the ceiling. “We’re definitely going to have sex, aren’t we?”

“I wouldn’t know, boss.” FRIDAY answers.

“Yeah,” he says, nodding to himself. “We are.”

—

They make a habit of cooking. It’s chillingly domestic most nights, so Tony jumps at the opportunity to lasciviously eat a strawberry from between Bucky’s fingers. He grins up at him, juice dripping down his chin. 

“Gross,” Bucky says. He throws the stem into the sink and grabs one for himself. Tony keeps fruit well stocked these days in both of their kitchens and FRIDAY’s on strict instructions to take note of the ones he favors. If Bucky’s noticed, he hasn’t said a word. 

Tony watches as he takes a bite, so over-ripe that he can practically smell it. Bucky stills suddenly with the strawberry held to his lips, a glazed look to his eyes.

“Hey,” he says, hopping down from the counter-top. He reaches for Bucky’s shoulder, slow and steady, but he still jumps at the contact. “You alright?”

He swallows. “Yeah,” he says. 

“You wanna try that again? You look like you saw a ghost. You’re not allergic to strawberries too, are you? I already made that mistake once.” Bucky looks at him and for a moment it’s real fear he sees. His eyes are wide and glassy, his pupils dilated black. Tony grips him tighter. “Hey,” he says. “Bucky, talk to me.”

“I think I remembered something.”

He steps closer, forcing himself into Bucky’s line of vision. “Is this a Hydra something or - “

“No, like a memory. A real one. Strawberries. They were so ripe, almost too sweet - it was like I really remembered something, really felt it. It was the middle of summer, but the end of the strawberry season. It was hot outside and they were warm from being out in the sun too long. And it tasted just the same. I think I was a kid,” he ended in a whisper.

“Alright, okay. Real memories. We can work with memories. Hey - you wanna sit down?” 

His knees buckle and Tony groans as he guides them both down to the tiled kitchen floor. “I was young,” Bucky whispers. “Like I was really just a kid once.” 

He traces the slope of his cheekbone, waiting for Bucky to catch his breath. “Of course you were. Everyone was just a kid once.”

“But not me,” he says. 

He allows Bucky to lean into his chest, to collapse his weight against him like a puppet without strings, and Tony grips him tight hoping that it might count for something. 

“If I keep remembering,” Bucky begins after a shuddering breath. “Am I going to go back to being him?” 

“No,” Tony says, resting his cheek on the top of his head. “Hate to break it to you, but that’s not how memory works. Maybe you’ll start to have more of a connection with your past, start to feel like it happened to you and not to some unknown solider. But you can’t undo the last seventy years. All of this in aggregate created you, not just the stuff from before Hydra.” 

“How do you know?” He whispers.

“‘Cause I’m a genius, Buck. I coded memory from nothing but theory. You trust me, right? Hey - I need a real answer from you on this.” Bucky nods his head. “Good. Then trust me on this, okay? If you remember more, if your childhood starts to come back, your life before the war, all that means is you’re finding a piece of yourself that was lost to time. And if it doesn’t, if the only thing you ever remember is the taste of strawberries in summertime, then what’s the harm in that?” 

“Okay,” Bucky breaths into the skin of his neck.

“Okay? Good. Now you wanna finish making dinner, because I’ll be honest snowdrop, I haven’t eaten since about nine.” 

Bucky takes a deep, steadying breath. “Alright,” he says. “But you need to actually help with prep this time. Not playing on your tablet while I do all the chopping.”

“Okay first of all, I don’t _play._ I have actual work to do, a job that keeps you in fruit and sudoku books. But fine, you drive a hard bargain. I’ll chop some stuff, I guess.” 

Bucky still looks a little pale when he stands, but his hands are steady when he reaches for Tony and pulls him to his feet.


	3. Chapter 3

Rhodey brings back Swiss chocolates from Geneva and they spend the night in Tony’s lab, tossing truffles into the air to catch in their mouths. They sit sprawled on the floor, propped up against the side of Tony’s desk, watching as DUM-E putters around trying to clean up after them.

“You know I really am proud of you,” Rhodey tells him as Tony pours them both sparkling cider in lieu of champagne.

“Don’t be proud of anything yet. It’s only been a few weeks.” It’ll be five weeks on Tuesday. Tony will always know the exact count - an addict’s internal clock. 

“But it’s been a few weeks,” Rhodey says, nudging him. “I guess I have Barnes to thank for that. You still teaching him middle school math?”

“Oh don’t sound so bitter about it, honey bunches. He has nothing better to do than keep my ass sober and learn some basic trigonometry. Though we’ve just started physics, so I have my work cut out for me. And anyway, you’re the one bringing home the bacon.” Tony bites into another square of chocolate, humming at the taste. “And you’ve gotta spend your time with boring old Captain America while you’re at it.” 

“He’s not that bad,” Rhodey says. “We mostly keep to ourselves.”

“Oh, so he’s not a sanctimonious asshole with you? It’s _just_ me? Good to know.” 

Rhodey takes a sip of cider. “I outrank him. Besides, I kind of get it, his whole deal.”

“Oh, yeah?” Tony tucks his feet under Rhodey’s thigh, getting an extra dig in with his big toe. 

“Ouch - look,” he seems wary, like he’s trying to avoid Tony’s fragile heartstrings. “In principle, I hate the man. He hurt you - he hurt you while I wasn’t there to have your back and that’s not a forgivable position to be in. But in some ways I kind of get it. I overheard him talking once, heard him say that when he looks at Barnes he sees a sixteen year-old kid again. And guess what, Tones, I see the same damn thing when I look at you.”

Rhodey shifts across the floor, ignoring the creaking of his braces, and pulls Tony against him with an arm flung around his shoulders. “And I do get it. Because if I watched you fall from a fucking bridge, if I _mourned_ you, and then it turned out you were alive all along and some fucking kid from the future was trying to take your head off, I think I would’ve done worse.” 

Tony’s tried to think about it like that sometimes, of what it would be like if he were defending Rhodey or Peter. But it never really made him feel any better. It was just a sure-fire way to get him five fingers deep in some whisky. “And then what would you have done if it turned out I didn’t really remember you? That I wasn’t the same guy at all?” 

Rhodey tightens his grip on Tony’s shoulder, as if he can ward off the very thought. “Then I’d get to know you all over again, you fucking idiot. And then you’d do something stupid like catch your hand on fire while playing with chemical accelerants and I’d wonder why I even bothered.”

“Yeah,” Tony says, closing his eyes. “That sounds right.” 

“And hey, in this new and distant future, if it turned out you weren’t the same idiot I watched grow up, then all the better. You’d probably have a much easier life.”

Tony snorts. “No kidding.”

—

When FRIDAY announces that Captain Steven Rogers is requesting permission to enter the lab, Tony’s heart skips in an adrenaline surge. He knows it’s irrational, that Steve would no sooner attack him in his own lab than he would forgive him outright for the Accords. But the fear is still there, undefined. It fills his throat, leaving him hoarse when FRIDAY checks in with a gentle, “Boss?”

“Let him in.”

Steve looks as immaculate as always, carefully sculpted, his hair parted to the left like it’s nineteen thirty-six. Tony can smell the pomade he uses, spruce and sandalwood. He breathes deep. “What’s up, Rogers?”

“You told me back then, when this first started, that nothing’s happened so far that can’t be undone. Is it still true?”

And God, Tony wants to tell him yes, because for a moment he’s that eight year-old boy in his father’s study so desperate for approval that he could claw himself apart with it. “I don’t know,” he says instead. “You tell me.”

Steve stands with his arms crossed, eyeing every inch of Tony’s lab with wary distrust. “When I first woke up,” he says suddenly. “When they brought me back, I had a really hard time.”

Tony watches him, his hands laced in his lap. He has a dozen easy quips, a handful of one-liners, but he forces himself to listen.

“New York wasn’t even recognizeable to me, hell the whole wide world looked new. But when Fury brought me in, brought _us_ in, war was familiar. And I think I wanted us all to be soldiers, I wanted to feel like there was a front line. But it’s more complicated than that, everything’s more complicated now. And I think I lost sight of some things.”

“Is this an apology or an explanation?”

“Maybe both?” Steve says, a hint of a smile at his lips. “I’m sorry, Tony.”

“While I’d like the record to reflect that I do not necessarily think I should be apologizing, for what it’s worth, I’m sorry too.” 

Steve nods absentmindedly to himself, glancing around at his cluttered work tables. “So,” he says softly. “When do I get to meet this kid you smuggle in every weekend?” 

Tony leans back in his chair, playing at casual like his heart isn’t going a mile a minute. “You’ll have to fight Bucky for his attention. I swear they’re thick as thieves, these days.”

He looks sad, for a moment, though he’s smiling still. “Bucky’s been doing a lot better, since you two started spending time together.”

“So have I,” Tony admits.

Steve nods his head, like he’s confirmed something for himself. “I know he doesn’t really remember being Bucky, but I don’t think he’s all that different. Not where it matters. He never did have any patience for me when I was being stubborn or setting myself up for a fight. He used to call me a yuck.”

Tony snorts with laughter. “Well you’re definitely a yuck.” 

He smiles but doesn’t look up from the floor. “He thinks we’re something similar though, Tony, so maybe you’re a bit of a yuck too.”

—

“Rogers came and spoke with me,” Tony admits. He’s been debating saying anything at all. He’s not sure he wants to dredge up every word out of Steve’s mouth for the hundredth time, because Christ Almighty he’s already losing sleep over it.

“I know,” Bucky says. “He told me he might and we had a talk about it.”

“Oh.” Tony looks down at his hands, surprised to find himself wringing his fingers. Bucky sits beside him watching exactly the same thing.

“You didn’t check? The footage, I mean?”

“No,” he says, like it’s an admission. “I stopped FRIDAY from flagging any more conversations between you two. I figure, if you plan to kill me, you can just as easily do it when I fall asleep in the lab or by poisoning my coffee. No need to scheme with Rogers.”

Bucky extends his arm over Tony’s shoulders, playing idly with the hair on the back of his neck. He needs to bring his barber in, he knows it’s gotten long, he can feel it every time Bucky threads his fingers through. 

“So what did he say?”

“He apologized, sort of. I apologized. Mine was more questionable.”

“Yeah? And how do you feel now?”

“Maybe the same,” Tony says. “I don’t know. What’d you say to convince him to come talk to me?”

“I didn’t convince him,” Bucky says. “He came to me, wringing his hands just like this.” He reaches down to untangle Tony’s fingers, keeping one interlaced with his own. “And he asked if I thought you’d listen if he wanted to talk.”

“I almost didn’t.”

“And if you hadn’t, if you’d slammed the door in his face, you would’ve had every right. But I’m glad you heard him out. I told him that he lost something amazing in you, and that if he was the luckiest man alive you’d give him back a fraction of your time and attention. And honestly, Tony, I hope you do, even if I might lose that fraction.” He smiles, squeezing his hand before letting go. “I suppose I’d still have a few to spare.”

Tony breathes in, a deep inhale just like his therapist always tells him. “Rhodey said anyone with eyes could see that you wanna fuck me,” he blurts out. 

Bucky laughs, turning to face him. “That’s part of it,” he says with a smile. Tony can’t quite bring himself to look at him directly, afraid that his heart is going to spill out his mouth, along with more stupid bullshit that he promised himself we wouldn’t say. 

“I think you might have a type,” Bucky continues. “But I’d rather - “

“Wake up next to me?” He asks in a hurry of words. “Because that’s what I told Rhodey. And - I don’t know, sit in the lab with Pete and argue about the _Star Wars_ trilogies even though you’ve only seen two of them and have absolutely no context, and I want to be in the kitchen when you come back from training in the morning and - “

“You’re too smart for your own good,” Bucky tells him, cupping his face and leaning in. “It’s made you stupid.”

Tony likes to consider himself something of a dynamic lover. He never knows how he’s going to play his cards until he has his tongue in someone else’s mouth. But with Bucky he was already pretty sure he would surrender to every nip and sigh and allow him to tilt his head this way and that with nothing more than gentle pressure along his jaw. Bucky kisses like he has ground to cover, like there might be trenches. 

He makes a sound that would embarrass him if Bucky wasn’t pulling him onto his lap, using every pound of that super solider muscle to maneuver him into a position that makes them both sigh out into the space between their lips. 

“Wow, never thought this would be a thing for me,” Tony says, a little dazed. Bucky is busy kissing down his jaw line, lingering on his pulse point. “But honestly I’m like twenty minutes and a hand on my dick away from calling you daddy.”

Bucky laughs, muffled against Tony’s skin. “You’re a nightmare.” 

“We could fuck standing _without_ a wall though,” Tony continues.

“How about we start with a bed and move from there.” Bucky fits the tops of his metal fingers down the waistband of Tony’s jeans and he groans with it. 

“Okay that part I knew about - the arm. It really does it for me. So how about we start right here on the couch? Bed later.”

Bucky hums against his shoulder grinding Tony down into his lap. “Well, Rhodes just stepped out of the elevator. So if we want to avoid - “

“Are you fucking kidding me.” 

Tony tries to leap from Bucky’s lap when Rhodey appears in the doorway to the kitchen, but Bucky keeps him steady, his palm flat against Tony’s spine. “We were just about to relocate,” Bucky assures him. 

“If I find a single _anything_ on that couch, so help me God.” 

“I’ll replace it,” Tony says hurriedly, climbing off of Bucky and pulling him to his feet. “I’ll buy a dozen couches, in fact, for every time I want Bucky to fuck me on one.”

“I hate you,” Rhodey tells him as they pass. “Like I actually can’t stand you.”

“Love you too,” Tony says pausing for long enough to press a light kiss to Rhodey’s cheek. “Don’t stay up. I think I’ve discovered several new kinks.”

He can hear Rhodey shouting after him, but Bucky stops to kiss him half-way down the hall and Tony can’t make out the words. 

“Hey,” Tony says, pausing in the middle of his frantic battle to undo his jeans before they even make it to his bedroom door. “Have you, uh, done this before? With a man, I mean? Not that it matters, I just - ”

Bucky kisses him again, quick and hard, and knocks the door closed with the flat of his foot. He’s more efficient at undressing and in what feels like seconds he’s spread naked across Tony’s bed. He’s super-solider beautiful, like he’s carved from fucking granite, in a way that’s too perfect to be anything but artificial. Tony loves the science behind every inch of him and his eyes linger on the chrome shine of his arm in the low light. 

“It’s been a while,” he admits, stroking himself with a lazy smile while he watches Tony undress. “But I think I’ll pick it back up pretty quick.”

“That,” Tony says, pointing at him. “I want to get into at a later time. But right now, for ease among other things, I want you to fuck me.”

“Okay,” he says, his voice low. “But I wanna kiss you, first.” 

Tony climbs over him, ignoring the click in his knees, and Bucky pulls him down far enough to kiss him open mouthed, his tongue lingering on his lower lip. 

“You know,” he whispers, grabbing Tony’s shoulders and flipping them so that he is flat on the bed, arching up into Bucky’s touch. “Steve told me you were dangerous once. I’m starting to think he was right.” 

He’s smiling, but Tony can’t help the rueful laugh as he traces his fingers over Bucky’s chest where metal meets skin. “He would think that, wouldn’t he. But you know the truth, now, right? You know that it’s guilt.”

Bucky swallows thick, pressing feather-light kisses to the scar tissue twisted over his sternum. “Guilt,” he whispers into his skin. 

Tony hums in lazy agreement. “A great mystery to Captain America. But I think you understand.”

“Better than anyone,” Bucky says, mouthing at his hip points while reaching for the lube Tony pulled from the drawer on his bed frame. “I think,” he continues, slicking up his metal fingers and testing the resistance against Tony’s rim. “I can get that brain of yours to stop working so hard. Take you off-line for a while.”

Tony moans his name. “If you manage that I’m going to chain you to this bed and never let you leave.”

Bucky is watching him carefully and Tony’s eyes flutter shut at the thought of him cataloging every pinch between his brows and every breathy sigh as he gently stretches him on two fingers. He feels a flash of too-sharp pleasure and Bucky hums victorious. “Found it.”

“How do you know?” Tony asks, annoyed and a tiny bit breathless.

“I may not have any recent experience but I’ve excellent observation skills.” Bucky continues to stretch him, brushing over Tony’s prostate with every other stroke, enough to slowly drive him crazy. 

“Should’ve known you’d be a voyeur. I must say, exhibitionism has never been top of my kinks list.”

“You liar,” Bucky says, taking Tony’s cock into his mouth for a second or two, a tantalizing suction of his cheeks before he pulls off. “You love to show off.”

Tony hesitates. “Alright that’s fair. Now get to it, Buck. I have a long and vibrant history of shoving things up my ass. I can take it.”

“Now _that_ I think we should revisit,” Bucky says, sitting up. Tony tosses a sealed condom at his chest. 

“Put that on, get your dick in me, and we can talk about whatever you want.” 

Bucky rolls the condom on with his left hand, like he’s wary of the metal against latex. He strokes himself, taking a bit longer than is strictly necessary with the lube, until Tony is practically whining against the bedsheets. He lines himself up and pushes in just as he dips down to ask, “Ever taken a whole hand before?”

“Jesus _Christ_ , Bucky. Have you been watching _porn_?” Tony asks until Bucky silences him with a long kiss, his tongue curling into his. He groans into his mouth as the initial flash of pain gives way to something deep and overwhelming, that sensation he gets when he’s pushed his body just a little too far - a bit like the serenity of an opioid high. 

Tony pulls away, a little breathless. “I’d put money down that you didn’t learn about fisting in the forties.”

“Well?” Bucky asks against his lips. 

“It’s our _first time_.” 

“You said we could talk about whatever I wanted. And besides, your generation didn’t invent filthy sex. I’m pretty sure mine did.” 

“Yes,” Tony admits, finally, hooking one leg around the back of Bucky’s thighs, pulling him deeper. “But never without drugs.”

Bucky hums like he’s curious, but Tony can see the way his eyes have glazed over, just as punch-drunk as he is. He grinds and circles his hips like he’s savoring it, until finally Tony gasps, “I’ve taken much more than this, Barnes. Seriously, _fuck me_.” 

Bucky, for all of his teasing, snaps his hips like he’s trying to drill through to Tony’s throat. “You know,” he says, his breath coming harder now, a drop of sweat sliding down the inside of the arm held just above Tony’s head for leverage. “You’re what we would’ve called a deviant, back in my day.” 

“Oh _I’m_ the deviant?” He asks on an inhale. “Mr. Let’s Start With Some Light Talk of Fisting?” 

“Mm, I’ll work you up to it,” Bucky murmurs against the hollow of his throat, keeping up his pace to a metronome’s beat. 

For a moment he can’t answer, too caught up in the feeling of him, the slow and steady rush towards orgasm. He reaches down to fist his cock but Bucky’s hand catches his, pressing it back above his head. “Not yet,” he says. 

“And here’s Rogers thinking you’re a sweet, innocent thing.” Tony groans, his eyes squeezed shut. 

Bucky hums, hiking one of Tony’s legs up and pressing down low enough that the cut of his abs drag across Tony’s cock. “Steve doesn’t know the first thing about sex. But by the time his Bucky left for the war, he’d been carving out boys all over the Bowery.” 

“God,” Tony moans, because he believes him. 

“You ready to come?” Bucky asks, nibbling at his earlobe. “I wanna feel you squeeze me.”

Bucky doesn’t wait for his response, instead he snakes his metal hand down Tony’s chest, his left arm bulging as he keeps himself steady, thrusting into him like he’s barely on the edge. “C’mon,” he whispers and Tony gasps at the glide of slick metal over his cock. “You ready?”

He feels something deep and delirious whisper _yes_ from his own lips and Tony comes.

—

Tony wakes, not to thoughts of alcohol and his delicate hold on sobriety, but to Bucky sliding beneath the sheets. He pauses to nip at the dimples in his lower back, before truly applying himself and eating Tony out like his life depended on it.

“Jesus fuck,” Tony shouts into the pillow as Bucky uses his metal hand as leverage, fluttering his tongue around his rim before licking solid and flat up to the dip of his tailbone. He forces himself onto his elbows and turns with barely enough energy to say, “You’ve been holding out on me, Mr. Ten Below.”

“I don’t get that one,” Bucky says idly, dipping one metal finger in and out of him with just a hint of friction. “And we just had sex last night. Waiting to rim you until the morning after is hardly _holding out_.”

“Hell yes it is, when you can use your tongue like that.” 

He feels Bucky laugh and the vibration make Tony groan, his head hanging between his shoulders.

“Stop laughing,” he mumbles. “And get back to work. We have a meeting in forty minutes and we both need enough time to not look like we fucked each other silly last night and then woke up early for a repeat.” 

Bucky quickly moves from two fingers to three. “That sounds like a whole lot of effort when I could just spend the next thirty minutes with my tongue up your ass and then we could both arrive ten minutes late with absolutely everyone knowing that I fucked you with the same lube we used last night.”

“God damn it, fuck, sold. Let’s do that one.”

—

It’s not the scandal Tony envisions. He sees Natasha’s eyebrows raise and Rhodey pinch the bridge of his nose, but otherwise no one seems any wiser for the fact that he and Bucky arrived at the same time, dressed down in jeans and a t-shirt, Tony’s hair still tacky with left-over gel. 

Rhodey leans in close enough to whisper, “You couldn’t have showered?” 

Tony winks. “No time.”

He hardly hears a single word during the whole debrief. Instead he inspects the relaxed line of Bucky’s shoulders, the way he sits with a bit of sway to his body, like he finally feels comfortable with the space he takes up at the table. But then again, maybe it’s just Tony’s wishful thinking.

Once the meeting finally wraps, with a passive-aggressive mention from Hill that next week they plan to begin at _eleven_ not half past, Tony stands and stretches, allowing his t-shirt to ride up as Rhodey gives him an entirely unimpressed look.

“Don’t think we’re not discussing this,” he says, as the other Avengers file out around them. “You owe me multiple explanations and at least ten uninterrupted minutes of ranting time.” 

Tony spots Bucky lingering by the door, waiting on him. Rhodey follows his gaze. “You’re kidding, right? Jesus Christ, you’ve been together all night.”

He pats Rhodey’s shoulder, trying to edge around him. “We have things to do - projects, math problems - you know how it is.”

Rhodey grabs his wrist before he can make a run for the door and pulls him back, bringing him close enough to murmur into his ear. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m happy for you. Though if I ever catch you two even semi-clothed in the living room ever again, I’ll blast you both.”

“Understood.” Tony smiles up at him, patting his chest. “Don’t you worry your pretty little head about it. We’ll be sure to stay fully clothed when frotting on the couch in future.” 

—

“Is this gonna be like that time Aunt May brought home a _very special friend_? ‘Cause I don’t think I’m ready for Bucky to start calling me sport.”

“‘Sport’ might be a little too modern for his vocabulary, to be honest,” Tony says, playing thoughtful. “But if you’re asking if we’re having sex - “

“Oh my _god_ , Mr. Stark!” Peter yells, clapping his hands over his ears.

“The answer is yes.”

Peter groans into the table of his work station. 

“Adults have sex, Peter,” Tony says loudly. “Even adults you know. This is a concept you’ll have to come to terms with eventually.”

“Is this your attempt at the birds and the bees?” Bucky asks as the lab door automatically closes behind him.

“Petey is learning about his changing body,” Tony tells him solemnly. 

“I’m leaving!” Peter shouts. “If either of you says anything that even vaguely references bodies I’m gonna go hang out with Dr. Cho.”

Bucky kicks back into his new chair, the one Tony had brought down to the lab just so he could read more comfortably and occasionally be an unwanted distraction and ultimately contribute absolutely nothing to Tony’s work. “What about dead bodies?”

“Feels unnecessary, but willing to compromise.” 

“Bucky, stop alluding to your wayward and coincidently illegal sexual predilections in front of the child.”

Peter rushes from the lab in a flurry of papers and a distant shout of, “You’re so _gross_!” 

“I’m still not sure what exactly happened just now,” Bucky says, turning a page in his book.

“Peter’s been wanting to look in on the gene work Helen is doing all day. I just wanted to embarrass him a bit first.” 

“By bringing up sex?” He sounds neutrally disinterested. 

“Well he asked if we were fucking, so I didn’t really bring it up.”

Bucky turns a page that Tony is certain he hasn’t had the time to read yet. “I highly doubt Peter asked if we’re fucking.”

“No, he asked if you were my ‘very special friend.’” 

That is enough to break Bucky’s carefully crafted expression. He laughs into the spine of his book and Tony grins over his shoulder, unable to keep a straight face. 

—

Tony finds himself staying in bed longer in the morning now that Bucky has, without any input from him, decided to shove a few pairs of joggers and a hoodie into Tony’s closet. He knows they’re both prone to nightmares and insomnia, that most mornings won’t be filled with bright, filtered light. But when they are he tries to savor it, to settle in to Bucky’s arms as their legs tangle beneath messy sheets.

“So you knew you were queer in the forties, huh? Well - other you anyway. He knew. That couldn’t have been easy.” 

Bucky hums into the nape of his neck, pressing idle kisses into his skin. “I don’t remember whether or not it was easy. But I know there was no shortage of street corners on the Bowery to find a willing partner after dark.”

Tony clears his throat. “So you and Rogers, then?”

Bucky snorts, rolling him over until their noses brush together, just short of their lips. “I’m pretty damn sure the closest Steve’s ever been to another man’s dick was in the army latrines.” 

“Sexy,” he deadpans.

“Though I suppose you never know until you ask,” Bucky murmurs into a kiss. “Smart money is on straight arrow.”

“He does wear his shirts awful tight,” Tony points out, nibbling absentmindedly at the cut of Bucky’s jawline. 

Bucky hums. “He might be settling into the fashion of the future, but I don’t think this - ” he reaches down to cup Tony through his boxers. “ - is something he’s thought through. His loss, really.”

Tony chuckles into his mouth. “Let’s stop talking about Captain America while you’ve got your hand down my pants, shall we?”

“You brought him up,” Bucky reminds him. He pauses to kiss him again and Tony wonders, not for the first time, if Bucky might have a bit of a fixation. “Was it easy for you? I’ve been reading books, doesn’t seem like you would’a had it much better.”

“Oh very easy,” Tony says. “I’m the trinity of rich, white, and male. So, society at large was willing to overlook bisexual and write it off as slutty.” 

“You are slutty,” Bucky concedes, wandering farther down his waistband. 

“I prefer the term hedonist, actually.”

Bucky pulls Tony’s boxers down far enough to tuck the elastic beneath his balls and begins to shimmy down beneath the sheets. “Whatever you need to tell yourself.” He pauses for a moment, tonguing thoughtfully at the head of Tony’s cock. “So you and Rhodes, then?”

Tony laughs, a hand covering his eyes. “Only in my wildest dreams. Rhodey is like a zero on the Kinsey Scale, not that I didn’t give him plenty of chances. God - keep that up.”

Bucky pulls off of him and Tony groans in protest. “Should I be jealous?”

“Oh most definitely. I’d crawl into Rhodey’s bed in a heartbeat if he’d let me.” 

“You’re a terrible - “ Bucky pauses and Tony pushes himself up just far enough to glare down at him.

“Look, I’m almost fifty. I’m not calling you my boyfriend.”

“You’re a terrible exclusive sexual and romantic partner,” Bucky decides on.

“Who said we were exclusive?” 

Bucky pinches the meat of his thigh and Tony winces his apology. “You know I don’t _have_ to suck you off.”

“I take it all back, you’re the light of my life. There is absolutely no comparison, no equal - dearer than eyesight, space, and liberty - ” Tony breaks off in a moan as Bucky presses his tongue flat against the length of his cock. 

“I don’t think that’s good enough,” Bucky says.

“I just quoted _Shakespeare_ at you, which I’m reliably told is the height of romance. What more could you want?” 

“Roll over,” Bucky says, pushing himself onto his knees.

“Ah, compromise.” 

—

Tony looks up suddenly, welding mask in place, and pulls the visor up onto his forehead. “Hey.”

Bucky hums, but doesn’t look away from his current sudoku puzzle. 

“I know you said you just wanted the math and science lessons, but you guys keep telling me how hard it was on Rogers, adjusting to the future. Is it - should I be socializing you? Sending you to lectures on feminism at NYU? Honestly you look young enough to fit in at a Master’s seminar.”

He laughs and snaps his book shut, gesturing for Tony to come join him on the couch. “Come on, you could use the break.”

Tony leans into him, as easy as he’s been leaning into Rhodey for thirty years. Bucky’s arm barely makes a sound when it settles over his chest. 

“So has it - was it hard on you, like it was for him?” He asks.

Bucky buries his nose into Tony’s hair and inhales. He told him once that the hair products he uses reminds him of something from before, something he could never put his finger on. It doesn’t stop him from trying though. 

“It’s hard but in a different way. I didn’t exactly wake up after a peaceful fifty years in the ice. There were slices of time where I knew what was going on. And I guess, when I escaped, adjusting to the twenty-first century was the least of my concerns. I spent so long wanting nothing more than to put a bullet in my head, that once I was finally free it felt like I was just waiting on the right time.”

Tony breathes in, too quick and audible for Bucky to have missed. 

“Don’t,” Bucky murmurs into his ear, nuzzling into his jawline. “Dying like that is so easy, so ordinary. It’s nothing to worry about, there’s so much worse.”

“There’s so much better, too,” Tony manages. 

“Yeah, there is. But I didn’t think I’d ever get there. Don’t worry,” he finishes, turning them both so that Bucky can face him. He’s smiling. “It’s a safety net.”

“You’d better not need a damn safety net here, you yuck. Rogers taught me that word, by the way, and I’m keeping it.” Tony can tell his tone is a touch panicky, and he tries his best to tamp it down. “Besides, I can _literally_ fly. Who better to catch you?”

Bucky kisses him and then whispers against his lips, “Peter told me that the new way of using literally is to mean figuratively.” 

“Don’t listen to him,” Tony groans. “He’s gonna teach you awful shit. You already look thirty, we don’t need to add to that. Cradle robbing is only acceptable with blondes at my age.”

“Well, like I said, you never know what Steve will be up for until you try.”

Tony punches him on the shoulder and Bucky practically cackles with laughter. “I should kick you out of the lab, for that.”

“I think you’d rather blow me on this couch though, actually,” Bucky tells him.

Tony considers him for a moment. “Decent point.”

—

Peter has a long weekend for one of the many made-up holidays that public school kids seem to have off now. So of course Tony hordes his time like a magpie, jealous and greedy. 

“It’s Memorial Day,” Peter had told him over breakfast for admittedly the fourth time. “It’s a real holiday. They have posters of Captain America everywhere, ‘cause of the war and all. I told MJ he’s actually a huge jerk. She said she believes it, ‘cause he comes off as suspiciously wholesome. People like that always end up having something freaky to hide, like they’re serial killers or they steal things just for the fun of it.”

He’d invited Rhodey and Bucky to join them for a _Star Wars_ marathon, but they both politely declined, citing everything from Avengers work to standing gym plans. Tony’s admittedly a tiny bit grateful. When no one else is around to see, Peter clings to him, sprawling across his lap or burying himself into his side, only pulling away for as long as it takes to grab a pack of Twizzlers from their snack pile. 

“Those are disgusting,” Tony tells him. “You’re disgusting. Get me a box of Milk Duds.”

“Milk Duds are for old people,” Peter says, settling back against him.

“Yeah? So is liquorish,” he points out.

“Twizzlers aren’t really liquorish. They’re sugar and red dye. Kids love both of those things.”

“Whatever you say, you weirdo,” he murmurs, smiling into his hair. 

They’ve only just started _Return of the Jedi_ and Peter is well into yet another bag of candy when he asks, “Did you stop drinking because of Bucky?” His voice is soft, like he isn’t sure if he’s even allowed to mention it, and Tony’s heart sinks. 

“Fri, can you hit pause?” Tony pulls away, despite Peter’s hand bunched into his t-shirt, so that he can look him in the eye when he asks, “What do you mean? Are you asking if he made me stop drinking?”

“No.” Peter’s still avoiding his gaze, staring down at the couch. “I was wondering if he got you to stop.”

“First of all,” he says, trying to imitate the tone Jarvis used sometimes when Tony would cry over a silly accident like breaking an old vase in the upstairs dining room. “I’m sorry that you knew about it - the drinking. I didn’t want this to be a problem you had to concern yourself with.” Peter’s ears are bright pink, but he doesn’t interrupt him. “Second, this has nothing to do with Bucky.” 

Tony pauses, looking down at him. “It has everything to do with the fact that if I want my liver to last long enough to book that wedding venue for you and MJ, I needed to stop.”

“Oh,” he breathes. “That’s not - I didn’t - “

“Nope,” Tony says, talking over him. “No argument. This is an issue that doesn’t need any response. I come from a family rife with addiction issues, and it’s something I’ve struggled with on and off for most of my life. The news could tell you that much, kid. But what the tabloids don’t know is that every time I’ve pulled myself out of it, it’s because I had a damn good reason to stay sober. This is no different. Bucky has been supportive, he’s helped me out a whole lot, but ultimately I’ve got a non-Judeo-Christian, post-structural feminist wedding to plan one day, so I’ve gotta be healthy for it. And look, I may not manage it every day, but I’m going keep trying until it sticks.”

Peter is tucked so far into Tony’s collarbone that he can’t see his expression. “Okay,” he whispers.

“Okay. Any more questions?” He feels Peter shake his head no. “Then Fri, darling, unfreeze Jabba the Hutt.” 

—

Some days are bad and some are worse. Despite the dappled morning sun light, some mornings Tony still wakes up to something deep and livid in his chest. The treachery of his brain chemistry lures him beyond the siren’s song of alcohol and back to speed and uppers and the concentrated high of his twenties. And he knows that’s all it is, because beyond the anxiety of having a kid with superpowers and the lingering stress of the Avenger’s play-acting like a team again, Tony is content. 

On days like this it feels temporary though, like there’s something at the edge of his subconscious that he can barely contain, a glimpse of paranoia.

“Hey,” Bucky whispers above him, smoothing out the wrinkles on Tony’s forehead with his thumb. “What do you need?”

He spares a thought to wonder if there was any possible variation of his life, any world in which a happy childhood and loving parents could have left him anywhere other than lying in bed at six in the morning, fighting to stay sober. Or maybe this is just who he’s meant to be and addiction is the number one static variable in the many pretend future’s that Tony once dreamed for himself. 

“A drink,” Tony admits. “Or something stronger.” 

“How about instead, I tie your wrists down and spend the next two hours edging you until you cry?”

Tony laughs, close to tears already. “I really do love you.”

“Good,” Bucky says, with a chaste kiss. “I love you too. Now where did you put the silk?” 

—

Tony’s not above spying on the people he loves.

Peter’s been stressing himself out over college applications, scholarship forms and personal statements, like Tony doesn’t already have a trust fund set up and a significant amount of sway at MIT. And still he juggles his advanced placement classes, vigilante justice, and plans for the future while Tony watches on and waits for a ball to drop.

And Bucky, for all of their nights spent trying to crawl their way deeper into each other’s bodies, still wakes sometimes thinking he’s in Siberia. Tony keeps the heat so high that they sleep without sheets and he’s sweat drenched and sticky by morning. Sometimes, it still doesn’t help. 

So when they duck out of the lab together for to a round of Mario Kart, the only video game Bucky has any patience for, Tony asks FRIDAY to stream the living room security feed on a holo-screen. Mostly, he just likes hearing their voices while he works. If he could, he’d carry feeds of them everywhere he went so he could hear Bucky’s soft-spoken conversations and Peter’s hysterical laughter at all hours of the day.

For now, though, FRIDAY’s video feed will do. And if he just so happens to overhear one of them divulge a problem with a clear solution, a solution Tony is happy to provide, it’s a lucky coincidence. That’s what he tells himself, anyway.

They chatter quietly in the background while Tony looks over a Department of Defense proposal for an A.I. controlled anti-ballistic missile system. Tony rolls his eyes. They really should know better by now.

Tony tunes back in to the video feed when he hears a woeful, “Why not?” 

“Fri, rewind about four minutes. What were they talking about?”

He watches as Peter leans side to side with each sharp turn, the controller clutched in his hands. “Hey!” He says suddenly. “I’ve been meaning to ask.”

“If you’re trying to distract me because this is the last lap, it’s not going to work,” Bucky tells him. He’s sitting completely still except for the movement of his thumbs.

“I’m not,” Peter assures him. “I’m destroying you anyway. I just wanted to - I mean - have you been catching up with history and stuff? All the things that happened?” 

“I’m not Steve,” Bucky reminds him, bumping their shoulders together. “I have a pretty good grasp on it already.”

“Oh yeah, of course,” Peter says hurriedly. “I just meant the good stuff, you know, the new stuff. Like you know how you can marry anyone now? Like, I couldn’t have married MJ when you were a kid, ‘cause we’re not the same ethnicity. Or maybe I could’ve, but it would’ve been hard.” 

Bucky sets down his controller as the match rolls to an end, declaring Peter the winner. “You got a point here, kid?”

“Yeah, I mean, you know how people can also - well you can also marry someone regardless of their gender.” Peter says in a rush.

Bucky smiles then, patient and amused. “Don’t fret, Peter. I don’t wanna be your step-dad neither.” 

“Hey! That’s not - well I didn’t. I didn’t mean that. First of all, I would be an amazing step-son so how dare you. But also,” he trails off, looking down at the controller held loosely in his hands. “You don’t want to marry Mr. Stark?”

“Kid, we’ve barely been together a month. It’s a little early to be hearing wedding bells. And don’t get me wrong here, I want to spend the rest of my damn life catering to Tony’s wild ideas and tuning out the terrible music he plays when he’s working. But marriage just isn’t for me.”

“Why not?” Peter asks in the same soft, unhappy tone that first drew Tony’s attention. 

“Because it doesn’t mean anything to me. I don’t really remember being your age, Peter. I don’t remember much outside of Hydra. I know what marriage is, and I know that people are raised thinking it’s the epitome of a romantic relationship, but that’s just not what it looks like to me.” 

“Oh,” Peter sighs. “Well what does it look like?”

“Unnecessary,” he says gently. “Doesn’t mean it can’t be important to you, or to your friends, or even to Tony. It’s just not something I care much about.”

“Well you should definitely check with Mr. Stark on that one,” Peter says, turning his attention back to the screen and starting a new round. “Because it will be super awkward if he pulls out all the stops and proposes with a flash mob and then you have to turn him down ‘cause you don’t believe in marriage.”

“What’s a flash mob?” Bucky asks.

Tony chuckles to himself. “Normal time, Fri. Catch me up.”

They’re watching a video together on Peter’s phone, their heads bowed forward in perfect symmetry. “I take it all back, the future is horrible.”

“I dunno,” Peter says. “I think it’s kind of romantic.”

—

“Just so we’re clear, I’m not too big on the whole marriage thing myself.” Tony watches him from over the rims of his yellow tinted glasses, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. 

“You’ll break Peter’s heart,” Bucky tells him. “I think he’s already set on being the ring bearer.” 

“Well, our dear little Frodo will have to wait on Happy and May, then.”

Bucky looks up from his sudoku book. “They’re together?” 

“Don’t tell Peter. He definitely hasn’t caught on yet and I look forward to the day he realizes his hot aunt has another _special friend_.” 

He chuckles, ducking his head, looking down at his book. Tony watches him for a moment, the way he taps his pen against the top the page, like a jittery metronome. “What’s got you bothered over there, Snow Queen?” Tony finally asks. 

“I know neither of us are big on - “ he pauses to gesture vaguely into the air. 

“Conventional relationships or societal expectations?” Tony asks with a leading tone.

“Sure. That stuff. But do you - would it bother you if other people knew about us?”

He takes off his glasses, rubbing idly at the bridge of his nose. “I don’t care at all, Buck. I’ve lived most of my life in the glaring, painful spotlight of the world’s media conglomerates, and honestly it’s given me a pretty skewed perspective on what constitutes privacy. My little peak into your talk with Peter is kind of case in point. That is all to say, I wouldn’t care if you shouted from the rooftops that we’re sharing the same bed. You could ask me to call a press conference purely to recite a sonnet detailing the many virtues of your dick and I honestly wouldn’t be phased.”

Bucky tries to look annoyed, but he breaks into laughter when Tony looks at him with raised eyebrows. “That seems like a bit much,” he says, finally. “Though I wouldn’t mind you reciting those sonnets in private.”

“I’ll start working on that right away,” Tony says with a wink. “But in the meantime, what brought this on?”

Bucky shrugs but finally looks up at him, a little bit defiant. He feels strangely, irrationally proud of him. “Steve has been really making an effort, trying to get to know me better. This me, anyway. And it seems like a poor way to repay the man by keeping secrets. Besides, I think Sam knew before you did, and he’s bound to tell him.”

“Alright, on one condition.”

“What’s that?” Bucky asks, like he knows exactly what Tony’s about to say.

“You need to really stress that I’m the most generous, skilled lover you’ve ever had. In fact, it would help if you implied that you’ve gone without sleep for the past few weeks. Really lay it on thick.”

He shakes his head, tipping his book shut and moving to settle himself on the edge of Tony’s work station. “You’re such a fucking yuck.” 

He kisses the corner of his mouth, chaste and quick, the kind of kiss Tony’s never had much use for in his life. “But I’m your yuck.”

“Sadly, yes.”

—

The next time Rhodey walks in on them, Tony is sucking Bucky off while he recites the periodic table. He’s been working on memorizing the elements and their corresponding atomic numbers and Tony felt he needed a reward. Plus, it is admittedly one of the more sexually arousing things Bucky has done this week.

“Astatine, eighty five,” he says, infuriatingly steady.

Tony pulls off of him, sucking firmly at the head and swallowing thick. “Atomic weight?”

“Two-ten,” Bucky says and Tony groans sinking back down onto his cock in appreciation. Bucky weaves his fingers through his hair and tugs. “This all I had to do to get you into bed? Memorize some elements?”

It’s a moment before he releases his grip on Tony’s hair and lets him come up for air. “Turns out - yeah.” 

Bucky gets as far as the lanthanide series, with Tony’s nose pressed to his pubic bone, when the lab doors slide open. 

“Barnes,” Tony hears Rhodey say. “Where’s Tony?”

Tony freezes, swallowing compulsively around his cock, looking up just as Bucky’s eyes flicker down to meet his. It’s the wrong move.

“Oh my god, is he - are you fucking kidding me?”

Tony pulls off with an audible slurp and clears his throat. “Fri, I thought we talked about this, baby.”

“Colonel Rhodes has override privileges, boss.” 

“I’m leaving,” Rhodey calls. “Fuck you both.”

“I was trying to,” Bucky says agreeably and Tony laughs, his voice hoarse. 

“Sorry, buttercup,” he shouts, but the door has already closed and Bucky’s reciting samarium’s atomic number while he traces Tony’s bottom lip with the tip of his metal thumb. 

“I don’t think you’re done yet,” Bucky says, dipping into his mouth.

Tony doesn’t disagree. 

—

“Oh.”

Tony is sitting at the kitchen island, a mug of coffee cradled in his hands, wearing a bathrobe tied loosely at his waist. He’s only minutes out of bed, in that half-asleep headspace where nano-tech and the draft amendments and his endless to-do lists simply don’t exist, and he can enjoy the quiet of the early morning. Except, of course, when Steve Rogers steps out of the penthouse elevator, wearing a pair of black running shoes and looking for all the world like a deer caught in headlights.

“Sorry - Bucky told me to meet him up here. I thought, well - “

“It’s fine,” Tony says, his voice hoarse from sleep. “He’s just getting dressed. He’ll be out in a second.” He pauses, taking a reverent sip from his mug. “Coffee?”

“No thanks,” Steve says with a slightly bemused smile. “Doesn’t settle well before a run.”

“Yeah, that’s good, because I didn’t make enough. Rhodey’s not home and Bucky doesn’t drink coffee.” He grimaces.

Bucky cuts short whatever response settled on Steve’s lips by waltzing into the room, pausing only to press a kiss to the top of Tony’s head. He claps Steve on the shoulder in greeting. “I’m ready when you are. You making breakfast, Tony?”

He snorts into his mug. “Fat chance.” 

Bucky rolls his eyes fondly and the elevator doors open just as Steve says, “Hey, Tony. If you ever want to come with us, we can go a little later in the day. Sam sometimes has morning counselling sessions and we do evening runs with him instead. Not that you - I mean - if you ever wanted to join, know that getting up early isn’t a requirement.” 

Bucky is staring at Steve from the elevator bank and Tony knows from the look on his face that this wasn’t something he tried to orchestrate. “Thanks for the offer, Cap,” he says. “I might take you up on it, but I’ve had an unexpected uptick in my cardio recently, so I think I’m maxed out for now.”

Bucky snorts. “Cardio for one of us, anyway.”

Steve’s ears are bright pink as he groans into his hands. “Guys.”

“Go,” Tony says, releasing them both with a wave. “Aimlessly run around the compound a while and when you get back maybe someone, and certainly not me but likely a member of the kitchen staff, will have breakfast ready.”

“Thanks, Tony,” Steve says, just as Bucky shouts through the closing elevator doors, “It wouldn’t kill you to put some effort in!”

“I have a heart condition, it actually might,” Tony calls back.

FRIDAY threads the audio from the elevator through to his implant. “Ugh, Tony. I meant _cooking_.” 

—

Once he loses the sudden shock of sobriety, once one month turns to four and he settles into something like happiness, Tony remembers why he used to drink. He starts waking to nightmares, slicked in sweat and gasping, but it’s not Captain America he dreams of. No one is driving a metal shield into the base of his throat or reaching for his arc reactor and pulling. Instead, he begins to see space again, a never-ending stretch of soldiers.

Bucky wakes with him each night, never quite able to shake the light sleep of a spy. He holds Tony tight against his chest and whispers comfort into his ear. He never asks what it is he dreams of and Tony never clarifies. 

Sleep starts to evade him, a slow decent back into insomnia. He spends full nights locked up in the lab again, testing and improving his suits, running satellite diagnostics, ensuring that a small army of drones could protect the world in his place if need be. He designs armor for Bucky, black and navy, the cardinal sin of color but somehow it suits him. 

Bucky always follows him on the nights he wakes without a hope of falling asleep again. He presses a kiss to Tony’s temple and assures him that moving from their bed to the lab is hardly a chore, and although he occasionally ends up passed out on the couch before the sun rises, he usually stays up, reading his books and working through puzzles. Bucky is always sure to give him a few hours of distance either way, before he inevitably forces Tony to eat breakfast in the kitchen while the table is still streaked with early sunlight. 

“You gonna talk to me one of these days?” Bucks asks, like he’s nothing but curious. He sets down a French omelette, his go-to breakfast this week.

“About what?” 

Bucky ruffles his hair, finishing with a gentle shove. “Alright,” he says. “But I’m here when you need me.”

—

Rhodey finds him in the living room, stretched out across the couch with a tablet in his lap. It’s one of his rare weeks off, where he can stay at home and complain about Tony’s public displays of affection, pretending to gag into the palms of his hands. The military doesn’t give him up easy, so Tony knows to enjoy it while it lasts. 

“Where’s Barnes?” He asks, shoving Tony’s legs aside to make room. Tony allows it, but the second he’s sitting he pulls his feet back up into his lap.

“Gym,” he says. “Training with Natasha. I’m considering having him train Peter. What do you think? The kid kind of just makes stuff up as he goes along and he can get sloppy if he’s distracted.” 

“Yeah,” Rhodey admits after a long moment. “I think you’re probably right. That’s not a bad idea.” He closes his hand around Tony’s ankle. 

“Buck’s growing on you, isn’t he?” 

“He’s really not,” Rhodey says. “But Peter definitely needs some instruction and Natasha might actually kill him.”

Tony snorts in agreement. “He’ll be thrilled when I tell him.”

“Oh my gosh, sir,” Rhodey mimics in a high pitched voice. “I get to fight with the Winter Solider?”

“He doesn’t call me sir,” he says, scrunching his face into a grimace. “At least, not anymore.”

“Mm,” he hums. “That’s more your jam lately, huh.”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Tony bats his eyelashes and Rhodey shakes his head, a fond thing.

“You’re alright though?” He asks suddenly.

“Sometimes,” Tony admits. “But maybe now, after all of this, I’m a little worse.”

Rhodey frowns, his thumb rubbing over Tony’s ankle. “What do you mean?”

“Because I’m sure there’s something coming,” he says in a rush. His chest heaves with the weight of it. “It’s what tore me apart in the first place and now I have so much to lose. And I don’t know if I can protect us from it. All signs point to extinction-level event, and I’m here thinking there might be a future where I’m up against something I can’t beat.”

“Tony.” He says his name like it hurts. “It’s not just up to you.”

“Well,” he sighs. “It feels like it is.”

Rhodey reaches over, resting his palm on Tony’s knee and forcing him to look in his direction. “Hey,” he begins, a wry smile at his lips. “You don’t have a monopoly on loving people, Tones. We all have the same amount to lose. So it’s really not - it’s not all on you.”

Tony privately thinks that he loves just a little bit more - that his heart and lungs and fingertips ache with it in a way that Rhodey’s don’t. He dreams sometimes of sinking into the veins of every person he’s ever loved, of feeling the flush of their pulse and living in the soothing knowledge that their hearts beat steady. 

“I know,” he lies. “I do.”

—

“I had an interesting talk with Rhodes,” Bucky says, taking a seat on Tony’s work station. He’s momentarily distracted by how low his sweatpants fall on his hips, the little sliver of skin, a hint of muscle. 

“You two are worse than FRIDAY.” 

Bucky hums noncommittally. “So you think the world’s gonna end.”

“Something like that.” He looks back down at his blueprints, an upgrade for his Iron Legion that would make the head and neck less susceptible to damage. 

“So you think the world’s gonna end ‘cause of some aliens.”

“Alright,” Tony snaps. “If you’re gonna fucking joke about the safety of our entire planet, you can go hang out with Rogers because I have work to do.”

“I’m not joking about it,” Bucky assures him, waving away Tony’s holo-screen to keep his attention. “I’m just trying to understand.” 

Tony can read the subtext there, he’s been listening to it all his life. He’s watching him like Rhodey once did, when he was fourteen and finally away from home, spending whole days locked in a lab creating things he loved as if they had the right pieces to love him in return. He’s wondering why Tony can’t just be happy. 

“You’ve seen the files and I know for a fact your head is full of SHEILD’s deepest darkest secrets. So doesn’t it scare you?” He asks, frustrated that Bucky can’t understand the dread he’s been drinking away for years. “That this can all just go away?”

Bucky smiles something honest. “No,” he says, cupping Tony’s cheek. “Because I never thought that I’d have a single day like this one. You made me tea this morning, in a kitchen that was warmer than you like, so you wore a silk robe that always slides off your shoulders and your hair was a mess. I’m happy with just that, because honestly Tony, it’s a fucking miracle.” 

“I can’t let this go, I can’t - “ Tony whispers. “Maybe I’m just greedy then.”

“No,” Bucky assures him. “I’m just older.” 

Tony pillows his head on Bucky’s thigh, squeezing his eyes shut while his fingers comb slowly through his hair. “And if this all does end,” he continues. “If you die or if I do, if we lose all of this, then that’s just it. We’ll have tried, either way.”

“I need to do better than try,” he says against the cloth of Bucky’s sweats. 

“You trust me, right?” He asks, forcing Tony to lift his head, to look him in the eye. “I’m gonna need an answer on this one.”

Tony slowly nods his head - déjà vu.

“Then trust me on this. When the time comes, you _will_ do better. I’ve not had much use for faith in my life, but I have faith in that.”

—

Tony ups his appointments with his therapist from bi-monthly to every other day. She calls it progress, this sudden backwards slide towards paranoia. Tony privately disagrees.

“Homework,” she says and Tony groans, spinning in circles on his chair while she waits patiently on the holo-screen for him to sit still and listen. He doesn’t and she continues anyway. “Try to do ten things each week that have absolutely nothing to do with either your continued involvement in Stark Industries or the Avengers Initiative. That counts any work you perceive as going towards potential world-saving endeavors.” 

“Well that’s easy,” he says, before he’s puts much thought into it. Having increasingly kinky sex in the middle of the day definitely has nothing to do with the Avengers, neither does experimenting in the lab with Peter, or teaching Bucky statistics and having him solve for standard deviations.

“Caveat,” she continues. “You can only count activities with Peter, Mr. Rhodes, Mr. Barnes, and Ms. Potts once.”

Tony thinks about it for a minute. “What about Happy?”

“Same rule,” she says.

“So what you’re telling me to do is interact with other people outside of S.I. and Avengers meetings.” Tony already really hates this idea.

“That’s exactly right,” she says. “Or, you could always spend your time doing something for yourself. Something that isn’t building S.I. or Avengers tech.” 

“You know,” he begins, as he stops his spinning with one heel to the tiled floor. “I think I pay you too much.”

“You really don’t,” she assures him. 

—

Tony tries not to think about it, but by his third day of consecutive denial he sets his head down on the coffee table and asks, “Do you want to invite Wilson to play?”

Bucky looks up from his hand of cards, eyebrows raised. “I’ve been with you all day,” he says slowly. “So I know you didn’t sneak anything. Are you feeling okay?”

He groans into the surface of the table. “My therapist wants me to talk to people who aren’t you and Rhodey. Or spend quality time with myself but we both know that’s not happening.” 

Bucky looks down like he’s trying not to smile and isn’t quite succeeding. “FRIDAY,” he says, finally. “Can you ask Sam if he’d like to play cards with us? His choice of game.”

Bucky is finishing off a batch of masala popcorn and Tony is nursing what promises to be a stress headache behind his left eye when Sam steps into the kitchen. “I brought Uno.” 

“We’re playing _cards_ ,” Tony clarifies, holding the cool edge of his glass to his forehead. 

“Right and I’ve brought Uno.”

“I’ve never played before,” Bucky says agreeably. 

Tony considers firing his therapist. 

—

Tony’s hands are in his pockets, forcing his shoulders to fold and appear relaxed as the waits outside the door to Steve’s room. He was the only person to ever request _wallpaper_. Pepper had sat swirling a glass of white wine and wondering out loud how they were expected to apply wallpaper without dry wall. 

The pattern, a dark damask print, is all he can think of. 

“Tony,” he says, stepping back abruptly. “What’s going on?”

“Can I come in?”

Steve steps aside and gestures him in. He keeps the door open though and Tony is distantly grateful for it. “Is everything - ” 

“Art lessons,” he blurts out, eyeing the empty easel in the corner of the room. Everything smells vaguely of primer and varnish. 

“What?”

“Look - you have a hobby, which is good, or so I’m told rather reliably by my various mental health professionals. But people these days take art lessons, if they want. If you want. History and techniques and stuff. I wouldn’t know, I’ve never held a paint brush a day in my life. But the point is, if you’d like art lessons, we can arrange it. You wouldn’t have to go anywhere if you don’t want to, we could vet someone and bring them here. Or, if you want an excuse to go hang with your fellow Brooklyn hipsters, that’s an option too.”

“Why?” He asks, taking a seat on the edge of his bed, his hands clasped between his knees.

“Well I’m teaching Bucky math.”

“Yeah, he told me.”

“And science on a good day,” Tony continues. “‘Cause no offence but schools sucked in the thirties and even if they didn’t, I know for damn sure no one was teaching you to draw.”

Steve chuckles. “That bad, huh?”

“What - no. You’re obviously very talented, et cetera, et cetera. The point is, do you want me to arrange art lessons?”

Steve stares at him until Tony is forced to tip his head and look around like it’s just curiosity, as if he hasn’t seen the inside of this room from security footage a dozen times before. “Very dated,” he says to himself. “Just your style. And anyway, you don’t need to get me an answer now. Whenever really. There’s no rush.”

Maybe this was his therapist’s point after all, to force him into remembering that tomorrow is an option. 

“I’d love that, Tony. Art lessons. I’ll think about whether I’m up for going into the city again. But thank you - really.” 

“You’re welcome.” He says, with an idle tap to his foot. “My kid’s high school crush is supposedly a little art prodigy herself. Pete told me her parents wouldn’t pay for drawing lessons when she was just getting started, but now Youtube is a thing so in the end she didn’t really need it. She carries around a sketchbook everywhere she goes, drawing randos on the subway or whatever. But anyway, I just thought it sounded familiar.”

“Thank you,” he says again, and this time he doesn’t meet his eyes.

He drums his fingers idly against his sternum. “No problemo,” he says and as he leaves Tony closes the door very quietly behind him.

—

Despite Tony’s nightmares, his bone-deep certainty of total destruction, the world moves on.

Peter spends an entire weekend filling out college applications and reading his personal statement out loud to MJ, his phone tucked against his shoulder despite the inner-ear headphones Tony designed specifically for him. “Oh, that’s a good point. So I shouldn’t mention my chem scores.” 

He jots down hand-written notes on a piece of lined paper as Tony watches on in distaste. 

The second he starts on scholarship forms, calculating fees and the percentage rates of FAFSA awards and Pell Grants, Tony cuts him off. “Hey,” he says gently. “Don’t worry about that stuff just yet.”

Peter looks up at him. “I have to,” he answers. “The financial aid and scholarship applications are due at the same time as my actual applications.” 

Tony pretends to let him start a few, offering half-hearted sums when he needs them, but he quickly manages to convince him that lab time is more pressing. He’s been teaching Peter to repair the Iron Man suits, all the while telling Bucky that it’s nothing more than a learning experience, that it’s nothing like precaution. 

“This is so cool,” Peter whispers, tracing the emergency cooling rig with one finger. “It’s so amazing that something like this came from your head.” 

“I’m willing to bet that by the time you’re my age, you’ll have come up with even cooler stuff.”

“That’s blasphemy, Mr. Stark.”

The weather is warm and rich, even upstate, so when Tony drives him home they take the Corvette and leave the top down. Peter shouts along to a playlist of Queen, following the wind current with his hand out the window. Tony keeps his eyes on the road, but God he wishes he could watch him sing.

He drops Peter off, submitting to the ritual of allowing him to disappear into the fluorescent lights of his building and wishing he could snatch him back. He forces himself to wait a full half-hour into the return trip before he finally calls May. He knows it’ll take that long at least for Peter to recount his weekend, the updates to the Iron Man suit and Bucky’s new culinary exploits. And eventually, once he’s told May every detail he could conjure, he’ll retreat into his bedroom to do the same exact thing to his friend Ned. 

“Tony,” May says as she answers. “Did he forget something again?”

“No, no. I was actually calling to talk to you. Is the kid in the room?”

“No,” she says, sounding a little worried. “He’s on the phone with Ned. What’s going on?”

“Listen, you gotta stop with the scholarship thing,” he blurts out, after promising Pepper that he’d tackle this subject with slightly more sensitivity. He can hear May start to speak, but he keeps on going. In for a penny. “Peter’s not going to be a scholarship student, okay? I remember scholarship kids, hell _Rhodey_ was one, and they’re fucking miserable. One little dip in grades puts their entire financial future at risk and grades shouldn’t really matter anyway, especially not at MIT.”

“Who says he’s going to MIT?” May asks. 

Tony snorts. “Of _course_ he’s going to MIT. And you know what else? No matter how many scholarships a kid scrapes up, it’s never enough to cover expenses. So even while they’re working their little overachieving hearts out, they still don’t have enough money to eat more than dollar store spaghetti. And that just means by the time exams come ‘round, they’re prone to cracking like eggs. It’s a vicious cycle.”

“Tony, I know what you’re implying,” she begins, but Tony cuts her off.

“I’m not implying anything. I’m telling you that I have enough money set aside in a trust to pay for as many PhDs as Peter could ever want. And it’s a very responsible set-up,” he continues quickly, before May can speak over him. “Fees are paid directly to the school’s bursar, including housing, and later his landlord if he wants to live off campus. And he’ll have a reasonable, but absolutely not excessive amount paid in stipend every month, with a little more towards the end of term so he can get books and supplies for the next semester.”

May is silent on the other end, but Tony thinks he can hear her breathing. He’s pitched multi-million dollar deals to the government and it’s put less strain on his nerves than listening to her think it through. 

“May,” he sighs, his knuckles white on the steering wheel. “He’s my kid. Will you please just let me do this?”

“Tony,” she says. “You’re right.” He can hear the smile in her voice now. “I know you’re right. It’s just - we always made him work for what he has, you know?” 

“God, he _has_ worked for it,” Tony breathes. “Show me a kid that’s done more, May. And I’ll pay their fees too.”

“You’re right,” she repeats, almost to herself this time.

“So you’ll talk to him about the scholarship thing?”

“Yeah,” she agrees and Tony pumps his fist in silent victory. “I’ll talk to him in the morning. I don’t know how he’ll react though, Tony.”

“Look, worst case scenario, guilt trip him. If he applies for all these scholarships, he’s going to get them over kids who really need it. Meanwhile, I have a literal building at MIT named after me - or whatever - NYU. I don’t care. I’ll donate a wing to whatever school he goes to. He doesn’t need that money, but plenty of other aspiring chem students do.”

“You’re terrible,” May tells him with a laugh. 

“It’ll absolutely work though. So keep that one in your back pocket.”

“Fine, but don’t go sticking your name on buildings for him. He’ll be so embarrassed.” She pauses for a second, and Tony is just about ready to say goodnight when she asks, “Wait. Did you buy _our_ building?”

Tony swallows panic. “No,” he says too quickly.

“Oh my god, Tony. Tell me you didn’t.”

“Okay, in my defense, I wasn’t planning on buying anything.” He’d just happened to add Peter’s address to one of FRIDAY’s watch-list protocols, and stumbled upon zoning permits for new luxury condos, aimed at the families of tech conglomerate employees who want to live far enough out of the city to feel distant from the rush, but close enough to commute. Peter loves his neighborhood, loves his little rag-tag street of neighbors, and Tony wasn’t about to let some thirty year-old Google product managers gentrify the fuck out of the kid’s little corner of Queens.

“When that notice went around about rent control - “ May breathes. 

“Okay, honestly, I have nothing to do with it. Except for the security updates. But can you even blame me? You had a lobby door that couldn’t lock for six years and absolutely nothing was up to fire code. Anyway, other than that it’s managed entirely by our real estate holding, and look, Queens is the next big thing. So really it’s an investment - ” 

May laughs and laughs like she can hardly stop to breathe, and Tony finds himself smiling at the empty stretch of road. “You’re such a fucking idiot,” she tells him.

“Hey, wanna learn a new word that Rogers taught me?”

—

That night, Tony rides Bucky until his thighs burn, high on the idea that Peter is just a little more his these days. Bucky has both arms behind his head, watching lazily as Tony rolls his hips, his breath coming in short bursts. 

“Think you can come like this?” He asks, a drawl to his voice.

“God,” he balances both hands on Bucky’s chest, letting his head fall between his shoulders. “I’m too old for you. At my age, I’m supposed to be having gentle vanilla sex maybe once a week. It’s the natural way of things.”

Bucky snorts and snaps his hips up with barely a flex. “I’ve seen you work in the lab, I know you can do more than that. Sit your weight back.”

“I have a heart condition,” Tony reminds him, but he starts moving again anyway, over-sensitive to the point of pain. It creates little pricks of light behind his closed eyelids, his body’s own kind of high. 

“I’ll stop you when you need to stop.” 

Tony groans at that, letting it eat at something deep seated, the part of him that responds so well to control when met with competency. He grinds down a little harder, taking leverage from his hands pressed to Bucky’s shoulders. “There you go,” he says, teasing him with feather light touches to his cock. 

“I’m gonna come if you keep doing that,” Tony warns him.

“Well, as long as you keep riding me after I don’t care very much.”

“You’re an asshole,” he says, without much heat. He bites at his lip as Bucky reaches down to cup his balls.

He hums like the jury’s still out. “I’ve been reading about cock rings,” he says. “Now those _are_ new.” 

“Sometimes I think you’re just with me because I’m up for anything.” 

Bucky grins up at him, tightening his thumb and forefinger at the base of Tony’s cock, making him groan in frustration before he strokes him hard, twice, and Tony is coming above him. Bucky is gently pressing up with his hips, holding against his prostate while Tony’s mouth falls open. 

For a moment, as his arms shake and his body rolls through the final shudders of orgasm, he wonders faintly if he might pass out. Bucky must see the way his eyes flutter, because he reaches up to cradle Tony’s neck in his palm before he’s easing him onto the bed. Bucky wastes no time guiding himself back into Tony’s body, rolling his hips slow and easy, his thumb lingering over his pulse point. 

“Careful,” Tony whispers, lightheaded like he’s mainlined fentanyl. “Or I’ll accuse you of making love.” 

Bucky whispers his name into his ear, leaning down onto one hand and breathing at his temple. “I could be choking you out on my cock and I’d still be making love to you.”

Tony fists his hand in Bucky’s hair and wonders deliriously if that might be the most romantic thing that anyone’s ever said to him. Bucky’s breath catches as he comes, but otherwise he doesn’t make a sound, doesn’t break his pace. Tony still holds him through it.

They don’t move for a while, not until sweat and come begin to dry on their skin, and Bucky’s weight against his sternum turns into an ache. Bucky rolls off him, struggling for a moment to tie off his condom before he stumbles into the bathroom for a wet cloth. He tosses one onto Tony’s stomach while cleaning himself at the bathroom sink.

Tony half-heartedly wipes himself down before shuffling beneath his Egyptian cotton sheets. “Come back to bed,” he groans. “I don’t want to get comfortable twice.”

He hears the toilet flush and the lights dim to black behind his eyelids, before Bucky is sliding in beside him, lifting Tony with one arm and pillowing him against his chest. “You’re overworking yourself again?” He asks softly, likely thrown by how close Tony is to falling asleep.

“No.”

“Okay,” he says, running his fingers in aimless patterns over Tony’s shoulder blades. 

“May agreed to let me pay for Peter’s college.”

“Oh. Tony, that’s great,” Bucky whispers into his hair. “Does he know yet?”

“She said she’d talk to him tomorrow morning.” 

Bucky hums and Tony feels it in his jaw. “So you driving down there tomorrow?”

“No. Why?”

“To talk to him after school or something. Tony - “ He says, exasperated but amused. “You know he’s gonna want to talk to you. And you also know that he’s weird about money.”

Tony snorts. “When do you think he’ll realize how much one of his suits cost? I could send all of Queens to college for every mask he’s destroyed.”

“Maybe don’t lead with that,” Bucky says. “But you should definitely go.”

Tony considers it for a moment, tracing one of Bucky’s nipples until it stiffens under his touch. “Will you go with me?”

“No,” he says gently. “You don’t need me there. But I will tell you that if you keep touching me like that I’m gonna be ready for round two.”

Tony rolls off him with a groan. “No way. I’m old and fragile. I need my beauty sleep.”

“You do,” Bucky says, kissing him soundly, swallowing Tony’s mumble of disapproval. 

“It just sounds offensive if you agree with me.” But he curls Bucky’s arm around his chest anyway, waiting for him to take the hint. 

“Sleep,” he whispers, and Tony has more quippy responses at the tip of his tongue, but Bucky’s breathing at the nape of his neck makes him forget what he was going to say.

“Good night,” he says as Bucky smiles into the skin beneath his ear.

—

No one bats an eyelid anymore when he when he lingers outside Peter’s building, double parked in a fire lane with the R8. Initially, there were plenty of whispers and stares, old ladies peeking out from fourth-floor kitchen windows. But once word got around that little Peter Parker had landed a prestigious internship with none other than Tony Stark, the many residents of Ingram Street accepted Tony’s occasional presence in their lives without question. It was as if they thought it only natural that one of their own would be plucked from obscurity and recognized for their genius. 

He was sometimes grudgingly fond of them all. 

“Yo, Stark!” Shouts one of Peter’s neighbors, Mr. Oliveira in an off-white undershirt. “Is little Parker late?”

“No,” Tony assures him with a wave. “I’m just early.” 

But really, Peter has no idea he’s here. He might’ve taken the long way home, bought a sandwich from that deli he loves, or hung around to watch MJ’s speech and debate practice. Tony forces himself not to pace and instead he starts flitting through emails on his phone, leaning against the side of the car like he’s in it for the advertising check until Peter finally appears at the end of the block.

“Oh, Mr. Stark.” He stumbles to a halt, but to his credit doesn’t seem all that surprised to see him.

“Hey, kiddo. You wanna go to our diner for a bite? May’s working a late shift.” It started as a joke really, Pete’s Grill in Sunnyside. Tony had passed it on his way to Peter’s building while avoiding a traffic jam on the BQE and he just couldn’t resist. They’ve made something of a tradition of it, with Peter trying increasingly oddball combinations off the menu while Tony orders a genoa salami sandwich with pickles. It reminds him of the days Jarvis would drag him out to Brooklyn for lunch at the same old Irish owned deli when Tony was home from boarding school. It’s one of his few fond memories from his life before MIT, though he’s never mentioned it to Peter.

They don’t speak on the drive down. Queens Boulevard is surprisingly clear for a Monday afternoon and Tony cranks up the stereo, AC/DC pumping through the speakers. Peter stares out the window, not even nodding along to the music.

He’s relieved to see that the only corner booth in the whole of the cramped little diner is free, allowing Tony to sit with his back to the rest of the room. He’s used to getting recognized a time or two in Queens, but this isn’t the kind of conversation he wants interrupted by photo-ops. Peter takes the seat opposite him, his eyes scanning the other tables with a thoughtless caution that Tony wishes he could take away.

Once he’s decided that the diner patrons are appropriately ordinary, he sucks in a deep breath with his knuckles white against the edge of the table. “Mr. Stark, I wanna thank you for the college stuff, but I also - I just wanted to - May says you want me to go to MIT. And I know it’s where you went, and where Mr. Rhodey went, and - ”

“Peter,” Tony breathes, making clear eye contact with the waitress who is attempting to bring them glasses of tap water. “I don’t need you to go to MIT.”

“But you told May - ”

“You’d be great at MIT, kiddo. And not because I went there, not because Rhodey went there, but because it’s a school that values innovation and raw intelligence, and they put funding in the hands of kids who really want to make a difference with it. My father taught me computers, coding, but MIT gave me robotics and that’s the best thing that could’ve happened to me. But Peter - if you decide you want to be a journalist, if you want to go paint at RISD or attend some little liberal arts school in Massachusetts, then kid I’ll buy the fucking sweaters. You wanna go to _Duke_? I’ll wear white and blue and show up to every basketball game and embarrass you while you’re trying to get drunk with your friends at the tailgate party. The point is - I don’t care where you go. I’m gonna pay for whatever it is you need, because that’s not up for discussion, but the rest is your choice. And you know what? I’ll be happy with whatever that choice looks like. Because strangely, and you’ll learn this when you’re older, that’s how love works.” 

Peter’s eyes are glassy as he stares at the cover of his menu and Tony takes that opportunity to signal to the waitress and order a basket of onion rings for the table and a cookies and cream milkshake for Peter. “We’ll be ready to order dinner in just a minute.”

Peter sniffs down at his menu. “I think I want French toast,” he mumbles to himself. 

Tony hums, pretending to look over the sandwich list although he orders the same thing every time. “We should give Bucky a French toast recipe. If Fri keeps brioche on order, we could have him make it next weekend.”

Peter smiles, still looking a little worse for wear. “He’s not your maid.”

“No, but he is my - “ Tony grimaces.

“Were you gonna say ‘boyfriend?’”

“Absolutely not.” 

Tony orders for them both while Peter stuffs an entire jumbo-sized onion ring into his mouth. He shakes his head as Peter tries to speak. “Swallow, kid, Jesus.”

“What I said was - I don’t wanna go to Duke.”

“Well thank god for small favors.”

“And I don’t wanna be a journalist and I’m not gonna go to some liberal arts college in Massachusetts. But - ” He looks down at his hands as he meticulously tears his napkin into little pieces. “I’m not sure I want to leave New York, either.”

“Okay,” Tony says, leaning back because this is a topic he thinks he can handle. “And why’s that?”

He starts on another napkin, shredding it between his fingers. “I don’t want to leave May. I don’t want to leave you. And well - MJ’s first choice is NYU. She says Columbia’s too stuffy and conservative.”

“Alright. What programs interest you in New York?”

Peter bites at his lip. “I don’t know.”

“Have you looked at any?” Because Tony has, and he knows for a fact that nothing short of Yale has anything even close to the kind of chemistry program that could stand up to this kid. 

He shakes his head.

“You know, when I went off to school, I was so happy to leave. I was miserable in boarding school, miserable at home. I was younger than you are now and already had one foot deep into a drinking problem. So I never really got homesick, but I’ve missed a whole bunch of people in my life, so I think I might get where you’re coming from.”

“It’s not just that.”

“No?” Tony asks. “Then what is it? And know that I’m not going to think any different here, kid. I’m the man who tried to actually bribe Rhodey with money to keep him from joining the air force.” 

“I can’t leave May alone,” he whispers. 

“Alright, kiddo. I’m gonna tell you something, and that something is totally between us. You got it? You can’t even hint to May that I’ve told you, because I was sworn to secrecy.”

Peter’s eyes widen, looking a little captivated. “Yeah, promise, cross my heart.”

“May’s not going to be alone, because she and Happy have been dating for a few months now.”

“What?” Peter shouts, causing some of the sleepy-eyed diners to turn and stare. “What do you mean?” He whispers loudly, leaning in like it’ll make up for his outburst. 

“They’re dating kid. Your aunt has a special friend. And don’t take this the wrong way, but a teenage boy is probably the last thing she needs hanging around a flimsy two-bedroom apartment when - “

“Oh my god,” Peter gasps, snapping his hands over his ears. “No, no, no, don’t say it. I’m not thinking about it.”

“Now, I’m not going to stop you. If you have your heart set on staying in New York, then that’s what you’ll do. Honestly, I like the idea of you being close. I can fly to Queens much faster than I can fly to MIT. But I promise you, Peter, we’re not going to leave you high and dry in Boston all year. You can drive home every weekend if you want, hell I can fly you. You’ll still have holidays and breaks, though I’ll bet once you get settled that you’ll want to spend them with your friends.” 

“MJ and Ned are my friends.”

“Ned isn’t applying to MIT?” He asks. “That kid broke into my backend like I was Equifax.” 

“He’s applying,” Peter sighs. “But we’re not sure he’ll get in. He didn’t have very good grades sophomore year. His parents were getting a divorce and stuff. It sucks.”

Oh, this Tony can take care of. He taps out a quick message to FRIDAY, instructing her to set up a lunch meeting with the Dean of Engineering the week that applications go out. “Well, you have plenty of time to think about it. Plenty more time, in fact, since you won’t be filling out all of those pesky financial aid forms.” 

Peter gives him a wry smile and looks like he’s about to say something, but he’s cut off by the arrival of his truly massive plate of French toast. 

“Eat up,” Tony tells him. “Growing spiders need a ton of maple syrup and processed sugar, I hear.”

“I don’t think that’s right, Mr. Stark,” Peter says, his mouth full. “Also - how can I drive back to New York from Boston on the weekends if I don’t know how to drive.”

“That’s what the summer’s for, Pete,” he says. “I’ll teach you in the Roadster, it’s an easier ride than you’d think.”

Peter’s face lights up. “The Tesla?”

“Alright, calm it down over there with your Elon Musk heart-eyes. He’s not a superhero or anything.”

“No,” Peter agrees, grinning around a fork full of French toast. “He’s definitely not.”

—

Tony dreams of annihilation, but he wakes to Bucky kissing the tears from his cheeks. 

He stares up at the darkness of the ceiling. “Fri,” he whispers. “Lights at fifteen percent.” 

The room looks less like the endless stretch of space now that he can see the detail of Bucky’s eyes in the low light. He settles at Tony’s side, whispering into his hair. “You know what’s gonna happen today? I’m gonna cook up some bacon once the sun rises, because Rhodes isn’t here to yell about your blood pressure. I’ll make you coffee with the French press even though you think the brew isn’t as strong. I can’t work that damn espresso machine. Then we’ll sit on the couch and I’ll kiss your shoulder when your robe slips open a bit, and you’ll smile at me with that look you get sometimes and everything else? Everything else can wait.” 

“You called it a miracle,” Tony murmurs, his voice thick. The way Bucky says it, he can almost imagine that every morning spent in their kitchen is something to pray for. 

“Yeah, ‘cause it is. Now go to sleep, Tony. The world will still be here when you wake up.”

“But will it be there tomorrow?” He closes his eyes and feels a tear slip down his temple.

“I don’t know,” he says, his lips lingering against Tony’s cheek. “But for now, it is.”

—

Peter finally gets his movie night, with not an insignificant amount of complaining from Rhodey on Tony’s choice of _Overboard_. 

“Shut up,” Tony says. He shimmies his way down the couch until his knees are tucked over Rhodey’s lap. “It’s my night to choose. And I want to see what I can only imagine is the fictionalized representation of every New Yorker’s day dream, which obviously includes finding me washed up on the trash-strewn shores of the Hudson.”

“You’re not as cute as Goldie Hawn,” he says, eyebrows raised.

“Excuse you!” He says, play-kicking Rhodey’s thigh with the back of his heel.

Peter settles on the floor with a small mound of pillows. “Hey Old Buck, hand me the popcorn.” Instead, Bucky begins tossing popcorn into the air from his perch on the adjacent couch, laughing when Peter tries to catch them in his mouth. He has a pretty high success rate and Tony is grudgingly impressed.

“Are we actually going to watch this thing or what?” Rhodey asks, sounding every bit the military colonel, softened only by the absentminded circles he traces over Tony’s shins. 

“FRIDAY, hit the lights.” 

Peter, predictably, is asleep before the kids are even introduced. He never lasts very long on Friday nights, already exhausted from his six o’clock start. Tony wishes, not for the first time, that Peter would let him hire a driver instead of relying on the subway. He’s worked it out and even with traffic it would cut a minimum of fifteen minutes from his commute. Plus, he’d be able to nap in the car.

“God,” Rhodey says softly. “The look on your face.”

Tony glances up at him. “What?” He mouths. 

“It’s a good thing,” Rhodey assures him. “Seeing you like this. You know, when you were his age, you told me you’d never have a family.”

Bucky is still watching the screen, studiously pretending not to hear them. 

“Well,” Tony says, reaching out to pinch Rhodey on the thigh in retaliation for the soft tone of his voice. “I was wrong. I already had you, didn’t I?”

“Yeah.” He says. “I should’ve known that you’d doom me to a life of family movie nights without a woman in sight, what with Pepper off ruling the world and all.” 

Bucky chuckles at that, though he recovers himself quickly.

“Look sweet pea, you could’ve brought home a lady friend at any time. That part’s on you.”

“Oh yeah? And subject her to you two stripping down in the middle of the rec room?”

Tony snorts. “Your imaginary missus would be so lucky. I was People magazine’s sexiest man alive four years running and Buck over there would put an underwear model to shame with that body.”

Rhodey breaks his stern expression and laughs as he hunches over Tony’s legs, shaking his head. 

“This film is terrible,” Bucky says, tossing a piece of popcorn at Tony to get his attention.

“Shut up, it’s a _classic_.” 

Tony watches Bucky roll his eyes and thinks of the years he spent wishing he’d inherited Howard Stark’s missing parts. He always did want to love a little less, to dull his mind and every human impulse he had with whatever chemical he could get his hands on. But God does Tony love them. 

He knows the heartbreak that will inevitably follow, just like he knows that he’s carved out too much of his chest to survive any of it. 

“Should we send Peter to bed?” Rhodey asks.

“Nah.” Tony settles back against the cushions. “Let him sleep. I’ll bring him up when the movie’s over.”

He closes his eyes, tallies up every beating heart, and reminds himself that tomorrow can wait.


End file.
